Fox on a Hot Tin Roof

While most men hit the gym before going on a hot date, I decided it was best to get my head in shape. So, prior to my first date with Theodore, I booked a counseling session.

“I am going on a date in t-minus three hours and thirty-six minutes,” I proudly announced to my counselor Dahn.

Sitting on a beige couch in her Kitsilano office, unlike other sessions, I was calm, cool, and collected.

“How do you feel about that?” she asked. Sitting cross-legged in her chair, her voice sounded like a gentle waterfall.

“A bit excited I guess,” I fidgeted with the cushion beside me. “Maybe a touch nervous too if I am being honest.”

I started seeing Dahn shortly after the second wave of this pandemic began to crest. After spending weeks in my own company, I realized I was not my best guest. While I should have been using my free time to write – all the books, TV shows, and screenplays I have talked about over the years – instead, I was drinking too much wine and struggling to get out of bed.

“I find it best not to get too worked up about this kind of thing, you know.” Already, I could sense my shell beginning to close up.

“And why is that?”

Grasping on to my ring finger with every single digit of my right hand, I felt my internal temperature begin to rise. The gentle waterfall of her voice had turned into the roar of Niagara Falls. Within seconds, beads of sweat penetrated the sunscreen on my forehead. I was upset. I was upset and I was present for it. Taking off my mask for a brief moment, I took a sip of water, and then placed it back on.

In previous sessions, I would have remained quiet. Directed by my gaze, my mind would have drifted out the window and been carried off with the breeze. Unconsciously, I would have suppressed the anger I felt in that moment, smiled, and put together any formation of words that equaled placation, for myself.

In previous sessions, I was a fox on a hot tin roof. On the edge, trying everything and anything to get off.

This time was different, however. My feet were on the ground.

“I find it best not to get too worked up...” I formed a sentence with ellipses. “I find it best not to get too worked up because ten out of ten times it doesn’t work out.”

“‘I find it best not to get too worked up about this kind of thing, you know.’ Already, I could sense my shell beginning to close up.”

I realized as soon as I said the words that I was cheating myself and taking the easy way out. Putting the car in reverse, I paused in neutral, and then easing the throttle, slowly shifted into first.

“My problem is that whenever I go on a first date, I cannot help but focus on all the reasons it is not going to work out. I don’t ever get to a second date, because as far as I am concerned, the guy never stands a chance to begin with.”

“What about the green flags?” Dahn responded. The roar of the falls now reduced back to a mere trickle.

“I am not sure I follow.”

“Well, it is common when opening yourself up to someone new to focus on the red flags – as you say, all the reasons it will not work. On your date today, I invite you to acknowledge the red flags while also trying to shift your attention to the green ones – the signals that it just might.”

Like a harpsichord in a philharmonic orchestra, her words were music to my ears.

 …

On the patio at Cardero’s later that afternoon, a seagull sails by as the waiter, in his crisp white shirt and silver clipped black tie, asks Theodore what he would like to drink.

“I’ll have a glass of your French rosé” he replies.

“Six ounces or nine?”

“Nine, please.”

Green flag, green flag, green flag.