This is a story about a surprisingly intimate one night stand.
Normally, I don’t do them. No judgement of those who do, but at this point in my life, I value my time too much to give it to a man who knows at the outset that he only wants one night with me.
Really, who has the time to do all of the vetting that it takes to get to a decent first date every time I want a night of tenderness and intimacy?
That is why, when I am meeting new people on dating apps, I make a point of asking up front what they are looking for in our connection, and tell them outright that I am uninterested in a one-night tryst.
As a passionate, open-hearted woman, what I am looking for in a connection is the opposite of one night.
I want the passion, the fire, the unexpected desire that so often arises when strangers decide to explore one another from the inside out, but I also want depth.
I want connection. I want mutual self-revelation.
Still, since I am not looking for marriage and I’ve had all of the babies I’m interested in having, I often find myself talking to men who think they are looking for a lover for the night.
I met one such man not long ago. Things began as they usually do.
Interest. Swipe. Sparks. Banter. Giggles.
So, I asked: “What are you looking for?”
He replied: “A one night stand, perhaps a repeating one.”
(They actually have an adorable word for “one night stands” where I live — stutz — a term that gives the impression that asking for one is cute and acceptable).
“Sorry,” I replied.
“I don’t do stutzim” (Plural for “stutz”)
“I am looking for love.”
“I am looking for love, too.” He replied.
“But,” he continued. “I am not in the place in my life where I am interested in taking you to dinner once a week, moving in with you or having kids with you. I am looking for a stutz.”
Now, I was intrigued, so I replied:
“I don’t want any of those things either.”
“I want passion, connection, mutual-revelation…”
“I want those things too,” he said.
One-Night-Stand as a Cover for a Wounded Heart
Trevor, I would learn, was not a typical match.
He began to demonstrate this when he declared that until we met in person, he would send me a poem every day. He made this pledge without knowing that I am a writer. He kept it too, sending me two poems before I went to sleep that very night.
His poems made me giggle, and blush.
When we first started to get to know one another, Trevor said he had been divorced one year. But, as the weeks went by, our texting lasting longer and longer into the night, I began to feel skeptical about that claim.
He was eager and attentive.
Though perhaps burned by life, he did not seem at all burned by dating. He later shared with me that I was his first match on the platform on which we met. He seemed giddy about it all, grateful for my attention, and even more so when he discovered that I am a real woman and a real lover of sex, who looks just like the picture he swiped when we connected.
The first time he arrived at my place, I discovered that Trevor was shorter than I had expected and truly adorable. As our conversation deepened during that first in-person date, as we inched closer to one another on the couch, I began to inquire further. As he spoke of his young kids and his return to his parent’s small guesthouse, the grief in his voice began to shine through.
This was a man who was hurting.
“Divorce,” he said, “is synonymous with failure.”
And, there we were…
What had happened to my flirty date just looking for a one night stand? It turned out that such posturing was a front for a broken heart.
The Surprising Places Available Men Hide
Women looking for love, women often lament that most men are emotionally unavailable.
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This post was previously published on Hello, Love.
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