The Accidental First Date

For those of your following along on Facebook or Twitter, you may have noticed a weekend full of activity (a rare sight in my life for sure). Friday night, I managed to accidentally work my way into a first date which turned out to be pretty fun.

It seems to have become a campus-wide project to set Lindsey up with eligible young men, partially based on the good nature of a close community, and partially at my own prompting. Everyone can see that my social life is limited, but I am surrounded by a great family that knows me well and may actually have social lives. So, permission has been granted to several friends to go ahead and make something happen if the situation arises.

And the situation did indeed arise.

Gail, a wonderful professor on campus, about a month ago, got the great idea that one of her long time advisees and students, Matt, would be a great match for me. She asked for my number to give to him, and she followed through by giving it to him. Weeks went by, and he never called. To his credit, what in the world does one say when calling someone they've never met before for the first time?

At some point, my friend Janet, another wonderful professor on campus, had jumped on the band wagon and was all about the possibilities of setting us up. And on Friday, she called my cell phone out of the blue around 6:30 pm. I was (of course) still at the office.

What are you doing?
Right now?
Yeah, what are you doing? You should come down to the MBA reception downtown. (Giggles.)
Why? What's going on?
Matt's here, and he really wants to meet you!

Um...no thanks? I don't think that a public display of awkwardness is on the menu tonight. But what other excuse do I have? I'm headed home to watch movies for the night on the couch. (Sigh.) Okay. Okay, I'm going. What's the worst thing that could possibly happen?

So, I went, and was swooped up at the door like prey in eagles talons. No escape now. Janet dropped me off right in front of Matt. Matt, Lindsey. Lindsey, Matt. Okay, we're going to get out here. (Poof.) Gone.

Imagine now, two complete strangers, standing alone in the middle of a crowded room, having just met ten seconds ago, completely alone but being watched from all angles.

Well, it didn't end all bad. We ended up talking for a few hours, and we had some things in common. As far as first dates go, I've had much much worse, so I suppose it was successful...although certainly quite accidental.