The burning question in New York City: ‘What do you do for a living?” Immediately people are judged and classified according to their answer, especially in a dating context. Being from the West, where everyone cares more about enjoying life, and where laziness is paramount, I have never thought of myself as judgmental in this regard as long as someone manages to pay their rent. I always took the stance that personality mattered more than anything. I’m a romantic - I dated slackers. Sometimes I felt a slight distress over lack of motivation, but I avoided thinking about it. Then I came to New York, where the men actually have careers…and my paradigm is shifting.
When I met Lucas, I swore it was love at first sight. I met him in Virgin Records – where he was working. I was as nervous as a teenager, making sure I paid for my CD’s at his till. He had a beautiful face: almond eyes with thickly starred lashes, chiseled cheekbones, full lips, a slight spattering of freckles…and dreadlocks. I am a sucker for this type, with a leanly muscled frame and quizzical stare.
I was trying to fit a lot of shopping into a couple of hours. My hair was in a messy ponytail, I wore glasses, I was not dressed up or wearing make-up. In fact, I was hoping I would not run into anyone I knew. But here I was confronted with someone I wanted to impress.
We stared at one another – a distinguishable heat in that exchange made him bold.
“You’re pretty,” he said quietly.
Now, here I was looking my WORST. It was not about my appearance, obviously – it was the subtext. It was too much for me. I mumbled something non-descript, blushed furiously as I paid for my merchandise, and left the store.
My friend M. was waiting outside. “What’s wrong?” she asked, noticing my irregular breathing pattern.
“I think I just met my match!” I said dramatically, recounting the exchange. “If I don’t go back in that store and give him my number I will regret it for the rest of my life,” I said.
"I’ve never seen you like this,” M. said suspiciously. “Go back in, but I want to see who this guy is.”
We went back into the store. I quickly wrote my name and number on a scrap of paper. I went up to his register. He looked puzzled, as I handed him my digits.
“I think you forgot something,” I said. Then I left, noting that his name tag read ‘Lucas’.
For the next twenty-four hours, I burned with a Romeo-and-Juliet fever. I was literally heartsick. I ignored the fact that he worked in a record store. I romanticized an entire future together. I lost my appetite. I told all my friends how I was dying for him to call me.
When a number I didn’t recognize showed up on my call display the next evening, my palms began to sweat. I called him back immediately.
“I was really surprised when you came back to give me your number,” Lucas said in a serious tone.
“I couldn’t help it,” I confessed. “This really isn’t like me…I just felt we had a strange sort of connection.”
We discussed the weekend and made vague plans. I was going with my friends to Bryant Park and asked him to meet me there.
“I’d love to. Call me when you are on your way,” he said.
I met Rhiannon and some of her friends around nine. Ridiculously nervous, I told everyone about this ‘love at first sight’ feeling. I could barely drink for the butterflies in my ribcage.
Two hours passed. Lucas still hadn’t showed, and I was a wreck. I called him.
“I’m coming from Brooklyn,” he said, “I won’t be long.”
Two hours later, he finally showed. By then, my nerves were shredded. Okay, so he had no concept of being on time…but here he was, in the flesh. He wore jeans, sneakers, and a vintage-looking plaid suit jacked which was rather ugly, but he was so gorgeous I didn’t care.
I introduced him to my curious friends. Then, it was like no one else was in the joint, as we narrowed in and found we had the same tastes in reading, writing, and art. He walked me home. I was dizzy.
We were inseparable for a few days. He was very reticent with the physical aspect of things. He liked to hold my hand or put his arm around me when we walked (he didn’t want to pay for cabs), and then after much deliberation he finally kissed me. I noticed he was a slow mover in general. It took him fifteen minutes to hand-roll a cigarette. But I didn’t mind, after all the dates I had gone on with men who tried to grope me after one drink.
I didn’t mind terribly that Lucas worked in a record store, even though he was thirty-two. Or that he had a degree in graphic design which he wasn’t using. Or the way he was vague when I asked him about his creative projects. He said he was a painter, but that his mother had all of his artwork back in Wisconsin. He said he was a writer, but then seemed to spend hours nursing a single cup of coffee in an East Village café without producing anything. Often I walked along St. Mark’s to catch the subway train, and I would see him standing outside the café, smoking and reading a book. He never seemed to have any money, and I usually had to pay if we went out.
I choked back my critical thoughts. He was lovely. He was quiet…maybe there was a reservoir of secrets under that dreadlocked brain? Maybe whatever mysterious project he was working on was so amazing that it would astound the critics when finally unveiled?
A storm began to interrupt my fantasies when he told me of his new master plan: volunteering for medical research for money, so he didn’t have to work at the record store anymore.
“What?” I was incredulous.
“These things are called studies. People make a lot of money doing it. Then I’ll have time to write my screenplay and make my film. I’m tired of working to make other people rich.”
I must admit to being slightly repulsed.
He looked up at me with those almond eyes. “I’m going to be gone a lot. I’ll have to live in the hospital for several days at a time. I hope this won’t be a problem. I travel to Jersey for my first study three days from now.”
“What are you testing?”
He looked uncomfortable. “It’s a premature ejaculation drug which they are testing as an anti-depressant.”
“Oh. Are you depressed?”
“Not really. Look, I really want to take things to the next level with us. Will you wait for me, till I get out?”
What could I say? His skin smelled of cinnamon, his kiss was delicate. On the one hand, I was ready to overlook this bizarre scenario as long as he truly seemed to have some sort of larger ambition. Hadn’t the director of El Mariachi volunteered for medical research to make his film? If Lucas actually wrote his screenplay in the hospital, then it wouldn’t be so bad. He assured me it would be a temporary thing, and perhaps I could smother my intuition for awhile and just enjoy the lovely things about this man who didn’t seem to want to get a real job. Perhaps. But what if he never wrote anything at all and it was all talk? Artists are notorious for spending more time talking about their projects than producing them, after all.
What if he was lazy? Although I am enjoying the torment of dating, I also want to be practical and think about settling down in the next few years. I need to respect my man as a provider, who will pull his weight and work as hard as I do. The father of my children can’t work in a record store for minimum wage, let’s face it. Or possibly carry genetic deformity poison in his sperm from being a medical research victim. Really, the more I think about it, the creepier it gets. Am I torn because of mere infatuation, or am I in some kind of love, and what am I willing to forgive at this phase in my life?
I have not yet reconciled this issue in my head. He isn’t allowed phone calls in the hospital, so our only communication will be through text messaging. It’s sort of like dating a prison inmate. I suppose I’ll have to wait until he gets out of the hospital to see how I feel…which is going to be two weeks from now.
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