Heather and the married guy

After the original 5 e-dating disasters, and the infamous "scrot guy" you'd think that I was completely put off of e-dating and maybe even men in general, but no, there was one last would be suitor who presented himself before I removed myself permanently from the e-dating circuit.

I met with the man that we'll call the entrepreneur for dinner after slightly bruising my ego on someone else who I also met through electronic means. In town frequently on business, the entrepreneur was looking for someone to spend time with during the evenings and not really looking for or interested in a long term or serious relationship that would "go somewhere" like pretty much everyone else in Fargo seems to be.

Although I knew it could be dangerous having drinks in or near his hotel, I decided that under no circumstances was I going anywhere near his room so it would be alright to meet there. When he arrived  he was fairly good looking, not exceedingly tall, personable, had incredibly curvy biceps peaking out of his short sleeved button up shirt and curly black hair.

I'm a little embarrassed that my first drink made me light headed, but I responsibly ordered pasta to soak up the martini and very casually nursed a beer over the course of dinner while he drank three in rather rapid succession. Dating is a nerve-racking activity so I can understand the need to take the edge off, but he had another reason to be nervous... that's right, he's married.

Now this wasn't some revelation that came up over forkfuls of alfredo, I knew that he was married before I walked into the hotel. He told me very early on in our communications that he has a wife and that he understood if I no longer wanted to meet with him. Having been the victim of OWS (other woman syndrome) myself, the situation piqued my curiosity. Maybe I would be able to in some way tap in to that mentality and understand a little more about how my own marriage unravelled. So when I agreed to meet with him after vigorous debate with myself, I agreed on the basis that it would be platonic. Who knows, maybe he just needed someone to talk to or convince him that it was an all around bad idea to involve a third party in the break up of a marriage. (Yes, I am actually that delusional and optimistic.)

Of course, he asks if I would like to come up and watch a movie, and naturally, he asks out of sheer concern for my well-being if I've had too much to drive, and insists that if I came up nothing would happen. And then after walking me to my car phones me to make sure I got home safely when I had just texted to tell him I had and thanked me for meeting him. And emailed me the next day saying that he really couldn't drink if we went out again because he was having trouble keeping his mind in platonic mode.

All in all, I'm glad that I went, it was insightful and I didn't know what I was going to get out of it and I still don't know what I actually did get out of it save this: maybe marriage is an outdated idea that takes otherwise happy people and makes them feel trapped and when any animal, human or otherwise feels trapped, they all revert to some primitive instinct that makes them claw like hell at the ties that bind.

Heather gets a tattoo

Since the age of about 12 I wanted a tattoo. Well, that's not entirely correct, I was very conflicted about the whole thing because it's permanent- therefore requiring a level of forethought, commitment and endurance (these are all things I struggle with and consequently haven't had much previous success with).

I didn't want anything girly or cliche and I didn't want something that I could even fathom the idea of regretting later. Most importantly, I didn't want it in a place that my dad would see it.

So on January 17th 2008, I had decided to go and book an appointment. Circumstances, experiences and well, just a need to do something all contributed to the decision and I even had a tattoo buddy who was going to get ink with me. Just after I had finished production day for the magazine I worked for at the time, I walked into the tattoo parlor in Stephen's Green Shopping Centre and asked for the appointment. I figured I still had 3 days between Thursday and Saturday to change my mind and forfeit the 50 Euro deposit they needed to book the appointment but to my surprise, the man asked what I wanted and said rather than wait it would only take him 3 minutes to do and to follow him back to the tattooing area.

I selected the Chinese/Japanese symbol for strength and asked him to leave it as just the outline. Very glad that I hadn't decided to wear a skirt that day, I opened the fly of my trousers and pulled them down to show him whereabouts I wanted the calligraphy and he transfered the outline onto my skin right between the cute mole adjacent my navel and my hip bone.

After looking at the transfer in the mirror as per his instructions, I waited for him to say something along the lines of "last chance" but he picked up his needle in his gloved hand and started right in.

The sensation was odd, kind of like a bee-sting that I wanted to swat away for being annoying rather than pain. While sat there, or maybe later, I realized that tattooing and piercing are semi-tolerated forms of self harm probably on the basis that there's an economic interest. Societally we chastise people that hurt themselves intentionally and really that's exactly tattooing is, it punctures, scabs and heals just like any other wound of that nature. It had never before occurred to me that potentially the reason why we chastise people with tattoos is because they're pretty (or scary) self harmers.

The guy drawing on my abdomen wasn't kidding, he was done in three minutes. I looked down at the quarter-sized angry red skin and was far from disappointed. Unlike people who drag razor blades across their bodies to feel some form of control or release from emotional overloads, I now had a tiny symbol of what I think is one of the most important virtues that an individual could seek to attain- strength.

I've pondered adding to the little outline since several other virtues require strength- honesty, faith, love, wisdom, and kindness but I haven't found the commitment yet (or the cash). But every time I see that tiny piece of flesh that I damaged it reminds me that good things can come out of hurtful ones, and that led to thinking of adding a phoenix... but thus far, nothing has warranted that much self harm.

Heather goes to Madrid

Written 2009
Happened 2008

Before heading back to the US of A on a permanent basis, I decided that I would take full advantage of my being on the other side of the Atlantic one last time and booked a whirlwind tour of the places that I should have visited back when I was an exchange student. I spent 3 weeks flying with cheap airlines and staying in youth hostels, living on a diet of architecture, language, culture and art, eating when I was hungry, resting when I was tired and just meandering from place to place at my own pace, and of course sampling more than my fair share of alcoholic beverages.

I had been in Madrid for three days and was due to fly to Barcelona the next day. I hadn't made great friends with anyone at the hostel in Madrid, but I got talking to some very young surfer-looking Dutch boys and though it was against my better judgement, they convinced me to come out on the hostel pub crawl with them. While in the lobby waiting for the group to get organized, I over heard some fellow American accents and we introduced ourselves, the two guys were from Green Bay- small world.

I had more in common with my fellow midwesterners than the Dutch boys (who were too busy chasing women to chat with me anyway). So by our seventh or eighth drink we find ourselves at this packed club and I overheard the MC saying "we're still looking for some more lady dancers for the contest up here on stage, the prize is 50 euro." Then he started introducing the ladies one at a time as they told him what country they were from.

I handed my drink money to one of the Green Bay twins and made my way to the stage- I like to think I'm a fair dancer, but when I'm drunk I'm sure I'm amazing at damn near everything. So I climb up on stage and he asks where I'm from and I say USA and he closes the entry. Then announces that the line of ladies that I had just joined were all participants in a wet teeshirt competition. Whoops.

Rather than be a spoil sport or worry about saving face in front of a room full of drunk strangers that I would never see again, I decided to just go with it... as the saying goes, when in Rome, you know the rest. The MC then pulls out a bottle of tequila and starts pouring shots into each of the participants mouths, being last, I ended up with more than my fair share and started dancing early in effort to get the crowd cheering for me early on in the competition.

Sadly, USA did not take the title that night because Miss UK had been wearing a dress and therefore competed in just her knickers and the skimpy white tank top, that is, until she took the tank top off completely and well, I just couldn't compete with that... or better stated, didn't want to.