Where do I begin?

I have been married to a great guy for over 20 years but before that, I kissed many “frogs” in my search for the elusive prince.

My dating experiences took place in the 1990s, so Googling someone was not an option. The local Jewish newspaper had a personal ad section which was where a lot of my dates came from.

1. The speed date before speed dating: I answer his personal ad and we agree to meet at a coffee shop inside a book store. We make small talk for less than 5 minutes, tells me, “I don’t think it’s going to work out” and leaves.

2. The semi stalker: Also a personal ad find. We meet for a first date, he seems nice, but I’m not sure if we click. He calls me for a second date, I agree, and on this date he starts planning the future. I tell him I want to go slowly and he still calls me every day. He shows up at my house with a dozen roses, I shut him down and tell him I just want to be friends. He still calls, even drops by randomly to visit my parents who see all of this as romantic and wonder why I’m not giving him more of a chance. They don’t see that what he’s doing is creepy and obsessive, not romantic.

3. “You pay the tip.” I was crushing on this guy who was a friend of a friend around the same time I met my now husband. Obviously, I enjoyed my husband’s company but still felt I needed closure on the other guy before committing. This other guy and I had this weird flirtation going on for a few months where he’d always say to me “We should go out sometime” and never call me. Finally, he called after a friend talked to his brother and his brother gave him a push. He proposed rather than picking me up, we meet for lunch at a Chinese restaurant nearby. The small talk was pleasant but not earth shattering and then the bill came. He looked at it and proposed, you guessed it, “You pay the tip.” That night I had dinner that my now husband cooked for me and he went all out with candlelight and lobster. When the other guy called months later, I was happy to tell him I had a serious boyfriend.

4. The road trip from Hell: The term “Friends With Benefits” did not exist in the 1990s but I realize now, that what it was. I was a naive 21 year old who had fallen hard for this worldly, experienced, 34 year old divorced man. The sexual chemistry between us was amazing and I, a reader of romance novels, thought of him as one of those heroes. I flew down to visit him on my spring break and our first night together was everything that I hoped. The next morning he was inexpelicably cold to me. It eventually came out that he had met somebody else and whatever was between us was over. To make matters worse, I made some comment about watching my weight and he told me that when I was wearing my bikini earlier that I looked like I had gained weight. My heart was broken.

I’m glad that all of this is behind me!