“No, thank you.”
I wave again and climb into my car, humming to myself. I’m determined to be cheerful today. This is already a better day than yesterday, right? I’ve done Wordle, and I’ve got a date tomorrow! That’s exciting.
Mostly exciting.
Okay, I’d say I’m feeling, like, 95 percent excitement, 5 percent dread. And I knowdreadprobably sounds like a strong word, buttrying to meet people using dating apps is kind of weird. It’s like you’re locking yourself into this weird social ritual called “The First Date.” You arrive, you exchange pleasantries, you chat about this and that, you eat some food, maybe you laugh a little, but the whole time it’s kind of like you’re on a job interview. A strange, nighttime interview for a position where you’ll do some of your work naked.
And, like, you and your date bothknowwhy you’re there, but you don’t talk about it directly, and at the end there’s always this awkward moment when I want to blurt out, “All right, well, thanks for coming in. We’ll check your references and be in touch.”
And that’s assuming the guy is nice, and not just trying to get you to come back to his place for sex. Which, can we talk about for a second? Because not only is it super annoying having to come up with excuses to get away from pushy guys (because if you try to tell them the truth, that you’re just not interested, they either get sullen and defensive or straight-up nasty), but sometimes the idea of having a one-night stand actually does appeal to me. I’ll see a guy on the app who’s super hot but also clearly not long-term-commitment material, and I’ll think, hey, maybe I should just go on a date, have a fun night, and be done. But that’s the catch-22 about men. You don’t want to have casual sex with the ones who are only on the app to get casual sex, but the nice ones will never push you for casual sex, which means it’s up to you to suggest it, and I’ve just never been confident enough to do something like that.
I tried asking my friends for advice once, but none of them had ever used a dating app, so they couldn’t really understand what I was talking about. Fallon met her husband, Ethan, doing her MBA (they were the two top students in the class; very Anne of Green Gables and Gilbert Blythe) and they got married straight aftergraduation. Divya’s parents set her up with her husband, Ishaan, but they’d already known each other for a few years through their families, and they were going to the same law school. And Martha met her husband, Jason, when we were in university and was married and pregnant with her first child by the time we all graduated.
When I tried to talk to them about how tricky dating apps were, their replies were:
Divya:omg, that sounds brutal
True, but not particularly helpful.
Fallon:You don’t need a guy!! Plus don’t you want to get your career settled first?
Also true, also not helpful. I know I don’tneeda guy, but I would like one, and at this rate, if I wait until my career is “settled,” I’ll be about seventy-five.
Martha:Is there a filter to show if they want kids?
Which is a valid question, I suppose, but probably the least helpful response of the three. I told Martha once that I don’t think I want kids, but she shook her head and said, “Just wait,” and then told me for the fiftieth time about how she thought she didn’t want kids until she met Jason, and then the second he asked her to marry him she suddenlyknewin the depths of her soul that she was ready to be a mother.
I’m not saying that it might not happen to me someday, but Ialways get a little annoyed when she says it. Just like Fallon’s convinced that life is meaningless without a career, Martha is convinced that life is meaningless without kids.
I suppose my life is double-meaningless, since I have neither. It’s meaningless-meaningless. Meaningless squared.
No, stop that, Emily.
I shake my head firmly, as though I can shake the negative thoughts away. I’m not going to let myself sink into a dark mood again. This is going to be a better day.
Dave’s daughter Analyn is pulling out of the parking lot as I get to work. I wave at her eagerly and roll my car window down to talk to her. I’ve got a bit of a crush on Analyn. She’s a little older than me, in her early thirties, I think, and from creeping Facebook I’ve learned that she then went to culinary school in France and now owns the highest-rated restaurant in Summerside. I have this secret daydream that she’ll pop into the shop one day, and we’ll get to chatting and become close friends. Which is extraordinarily unlikely, since she works about a million hours a week and probably already has hundreds of friends.
“Morning, Analyn!” I call brightly.
“Morning,” she calls back, waving.
Then she pulls out onto the road and drives off. Which is totally fine. I need to get inside and get to work anyway.
I answer a few phone messages and clean off the layer of grime on the window that seems to have regrown overnight, then wipe down the bathroom taps, which are covered in Dave’s and John’s trademark black fingerprints. I don’t know how they can stand it. I don’t even work in the garage yet I still somehow go home with little smears of oil and grease on my clothes.
(Actually, who am I kidding? They probably don’t even notice.)
John comes in a few minutes after nine from whatever nondescript “thing” he mentioned he had this morning and goes straight to the open garage without stopping at the front desk. The morning passes by unusually quickly, with plenty of phone calls and customers flitting in and out. None of them stay to chat, but there’s a distinct sense of cheeriness in the air. It’s the nicest day so far this spring. The sky is a really bright shade of blue and I can hear birds chirping outside the windows. It’s like the whole world is conspiring to lift my spirits.
(And yes, obviously I realize the weather is not actually related to my life, but just—let me have this one, okay?)
At lunch, I sit down in the break room and pull out my handwritten “Dream Job List.” It’s a list I started a little while ago of all the things I want my dream job to have. So far, it’s this:
Located in a big city (i.e., New York, Paris, London)
This one’s a biggie. Don’t get me wrong, I think small towns are lovely, but I want to be somewherevibrant. Somewhere I can meet incredible people and go to art galleries and theater shows. Somewhere I can be a part of something important, somewhere I can really make something of myself.
In a creative field
