When I think back to when I was single, I remember feeling that
dating was a total waste of time, energy and emotion. What kept
me going was my aversion to being single and my deep yearning to love someone. Some dates were so painful I swore I'd never date again. One of them makes me cringe just thinking about it. Actually, when I think about what I learned, it wasn't so bad. As hard as this experience was for me, it forced me to see some of the mistakes I made, mistakes I will not repeat.

At the time I met Priscilla, a day didn't go by without me thinking, "If only I had a girlfriend. I'm not going to be happy unless I'm in a relationship. When is my time going to come?"

I was at a conference. As I was walking through the hotel during
a break, feeling bored and about to go home, Priscilla stopped
to talk to me about the various workshops, which ones were good,
which ones weren't, etc. We got into a conversation.

In the course of a five-minute conversation, I learned the following things about her. She lived in Los Angeles (I was living in San Francisco). She was a dancer and was pursuing a career as a therapist. I thought she was attractive. She had a great body. Most of all, I got the feeling she liked me. I asked her for a number and she told me she'd be looking forward to my phone call.

From the time we parted, I couldn't stop thinking about her. "Wow, what a classy woman! A dancer! An artist. Someone I can look up to. She's got everything; sex appeal, intelligence, life experience and sensitivity; a real woman. Best one to come along in years."

She was happy to hear from me. The first conversation we had was an hour. We continued to talk long distance, two and three times a week, one to two hours at a time. In comparing our respective relationship notes, I was better than any man she'd ever been with and she was better than any woman I'd ever been with. We were everything made a plan to get together. I was going to fly down to see her for a weekend.

As I was eagerly getting off the plane, I looked for Priscilla. When I spotted her, I was struck by how different she looked than from how I remembered her. She was dressed up, with a ton of jewelry and make-up on. I didn't know why she got so dressed up. And, what was with all that jewelry and make-up? It was mystery to me why so many women try to look better by doing things that make them look worse. Maybe she wanted to look good for me. I'm not that appearance oriented anyway. It's the person underneath the make-up and jewelry I came to see. But then, as we were getting into her car, I started feeling a bit out of place. She was driving a brand new T-bird. Another string of judgmental thoughts ran through my mind. I'm a working-class guy from Brooklyn. I never had a new car. My father never had one. Besides, why would anyone need one of those big, gas-eating American cars just to go to work? I hope she's not one of these rich, spoiled princesses. Again, I calmed myself down. I kept telling myself not to condemn her because she drives a big new car. Maybe she goes on long trips and likes to be comfortable. What difference does it make whether I like her car?

It got a lot better when we got to her house. It was a huge house in the Hollywood Hills with a swimming pool, a phenomenal view and lots of bedrooms. With room enough for me, I wondered what it would be like to live there and was quite contented with the idea.

For the next several hours, I sat with her in the living room, talking and enjoying the view, but not the conversation. To describe our chemistry, "flat" would not be an understatement. Even though she was friendly, welcoming and definitely liked me, something was missing. I couldn't put my finger on it. We had a bottle of wine, which didn't help much.

How could anything be missing after all those hours of incredible phone conversation?" I was doing everything I could possibly do to talk myself out of my feelings. I kept telling myself, You’ve got a lot of time and money and emotional investment here, to give it all up so fast. You better give it some time. Besides, I still had going to bed with that beautiful dancer's body to look forward to.

By the time we were actually in bed, I was feeling really sick. I was numb. Even though I felt like a shrunken prune, I believed once we got naked, I'd perk up. That never happened. I was not attracted or aroused. Much to my amazement, we had sex nonetheless. I don't know how we did, but we did. For the first time in my life, I felt I understood what "your body has a life of its own" really means.

Things continued in this vein for the rest of the weekend. Nothing worked. I found her to be superficial and boring, not my type. I like depth and vulnerability, not someone who is so nice, someone who acted as if everything was just how it was on the telephone. How could she not know that this wasn't working? And if she did know, how could she not say anything?

Monday morning came. I had a two o clock flight. I couldn't wait. She was acting like we were going to get married. There was no doubt in my mind that I did not want to see her again. What was I going to do? The moment of truth was upon me. I had to tell her how I felt.

This was the hardest part. She wasn't getting it. I told her that it didn't work for me and I didn't want to pursue the relationship any further. We had gone back and forth with her trying to convince me to give the relationship more of a chance. It got so bad I broke down in tears. "I didn't know it would be this way. I'm sorry. The last thing I ever wanted to do was hurt you."

On the flight back, I was asking myself one question. How did this happen? No way did I ever want to go through anything like that again.

I thought that it probably would have been different if I had been able to tell her sooner that I wasn't interested. But how could I have known then what I knew subsequently? There was no way I could have avoided it. I had to go through it. I could only learn from this experience... I jumped ahead, assuming a relationship before it actually happened. I mistook her ability to make me feel wanted and worthwhile for compatibility. I thought there would be great physical chemistry based on an initial sexual attraction.