My First Date with my Husband
So, how do you date nowadays? I have people ask me. How did you find your husband? They’re so curious. Like I’ve found him under a rock.
I don’t think I have to tell you ladies that dating in the 21st century is ….well, terrible. You know what our parents didn’t have to deal with? Swiping on apps like you would a menu. How does one respond to “sup” on an app?
Dating during the height of COVID was very difficult. Nobody could leave. In Israel, we had three lockdowns where you couldn’t go farther than 50 meters from your house. How many feet is that? Like 4. How were you supposed to date, you ask? There were no restaurants you could sit down at. Gatherings of over 20 people were forbidden.
Thankfully, the internet was alive and well.
I met my husband on this dating site called “OKcupid.” It’s a largely American site (sorry, North American site for you Canadians) but it’s expanded out to Israel. Yes, Aunt Nancy, that means there were plenty of Jews for me to pick.
Dating sites for straight women are very different than they are for men. I got too many messages from guys, even if we weren’t even compatible. Wading through the many messages and figuring out who wasn’t a stalker/murderer was tough. Guys, on the other hand, send out twenty messages a day and receive maybe one reply. (So I’ve heard).
Anyway, Zev was one of the many profiles I had swiped right on. I can’t say his profile stood out to me. He seemed nice and had no murderer vibes in his pictures, which was nice.
We arranged to meet up in a park. The COVID laws were now that one must meet people outside while wearing masks.
“Let’s meet during the day so you have a less of a chance for murdering me,” was definitely one of the first messages I sent him.
“Sounds great,” was his reply.
Online dating has this added awkwardness that when you finally meet in person you have this hesitation whether or not the person you’re meeting in real life was the person on the app. Usually, the guy looks like his picture. There are awkward pauses when you wonder if they really are 5”8, or if their hair would look like that if they hadn’t cut it in 5–6 weeks.
I chose to meet in a park called Bell Park which is known as this because it has a fun giant blue dragon for kids to play on. (There’s probably a bell there too.) I, of course, arrived late, and started wandering around asking people where the dragon was. I met some people who only spoke Arabic, and they had no idea where this “dragon” was supposed to be in a park. I probably alarmed them greatly.
Anyway, I had some kind of idea where it was, so I walked farther into the park and finally saw, in the distance, the dragon!
I hurried up and saw a guy sitting in a nice alcove with overgrown ivy trailing over the bricks. It was super romantic.
“Zev?” I said quietly.
His head rose. He looked at me. “Yes!”
I approached hesitantly, my heart racing. “Hi, are you Zev?” I asked again.
Which is a good thing because he was like “No, I’m not Zev.”
Now I was both embarrassed and confused. Why did you react and look up when I said Zev?? Anyway, I kept walking and finally did see Zev, who looked like his picture (along with hair that hadn’t been cut in 5–6 weeks) and did respond to his name. Phew!
We had a good back-and-forth which is great on a first date. I am super judgey on first dates. If the guy doesn’t ask enough questions about me, it means he is shallow. If he doesn’t have al ot to say, it means he has terrible social skills. If he doesn’t find me funny, he has a bad sense of humor.
Now that I’m like, happily married, I can look back and see how my harsh judgements, especially for a first-time meeting, may have been detrimental to my dating. In fact, my date with Zev, which I’m sure was a normal, run of the mill conversation (except the part where I told Zev I hit a kid with a car and he responded nonchalantly, but I’ll get to that), and I didn’t put too much pressure on the conversation. It was nice just to be out and speaking to a new human. COVID times are rough, especially during the lockdowns. There’s only so much Jane the Virgin you could watch until you miss the company of other people.
Being less judgey and critical for a person’s responses is a huge blessing you could give yourself on first dates. Remember, the person’s probably just as nervous as you are. Maybe they’re being more quiet because they’re unsure of how lame they’ll look discussing their fascination with 5th-century architecture. I am sure that if Zev started nerding out like that on our first date, there would not have been a second one.
Anyway, remember this date we were fully masked (as per the rules) but then we had this fun misunderstanding where it required us to remove our masks because it’s just hard to hear someone. I know that I speak quietly and have been misheard many times, especially on dates. (See this story for more awkward moments of my quiet voice).
I was talking about grocery shopping, as you do on dates. I think it was about my hatred of grocery carts. “I once hit a kid with a cart,” I said, still feeling that mortification and the kid’s poor sad face when my cart pushed into him head-on.
Zev then heard me say “car,” which is much more horrifying, but he didn’t react in a way when you hear someone feeling bad about hitting a kid with a car, which I would do in horror and ask clarification questions.
Zev then politely asked, “You mean you hit a kid with your car?” in quiet amusement.
I then had to take off my mask and explain that no, I did not hit a child with heavy machinery, and hence our true love was born and we knew we were the perfect match.
Anyway, despite those awkward moments on our first date, we did indeed realize we were soulmates and now are married and in love and all that crap.
Overall, after many many first dates, I finally had that one last first date. And it’s never perfect. But in a way, it was.
