Big Red Flag

Why don't we see the big red flags when they wave right in front of us? Are we desperate or just damaged from way back when?

“I’m pulling up to Starbucks,” I told Vivian, my dear friend and dating advisor.

“I want a full report,” she said from her West Village kitchen 3,000 miles away. “Remember, you are fabulous and deserve the best.  You see a red flag, you run like hell.”

“10-4, good buddy.  No blowhards, no broke posers living with their exes, no allergic wimps who ask me to swap out all my bathing products.  Been there, over and out.”  I ended the call, parked, smacked gloss on my lips.  I fast-walked (don’t know any other speed) down Santa Monica Boulevard toward the sterile, first-date go-to, repeating my mantra: “It’s only coffee.  Expect nothing.”

I stepped inside, excited to meet the sexy scholar who showed off his tan pecs in his shirtless JDate profile pic.  It was his primary photo, a tiny red flag, but at least it wasn’t a selfie dangling a swordfish or straddling a Harley.  He certainly checked my brawn and brain boxes.  His headline read: “Thinker, teacher, humanist.”  And dreamy, aqua eyes, how could I resist? 

As I beelined for him in line, he flashed his baby blues and smiled.  So far, so good; he was not disappointed by me.  Maybe I checked a few of his boxes, too; I’d made the effort to do the whole eye shadow and tight-shirt thing.  He bought me a latte, and we sat, launching into the first date drill.  As always, I leaned in and asked a lot of questions.

“Where do you teach?” I asked.

“I not only teach, I counsel people, too,” he said. 

“Me too,” I said, pleased by the connection. “As a professor I’ve probably mentored several hundred aspiring screenwriters. I’ve been writing since I could pick up a pencil.  I just sold my first television pilot.”

“Wonderful,” he grinned.  But he hadn’t answered my first question.

 I pressed him. “Where exactly do you – uh – work your magic?”

“At the synagogue.  The one just up the corner.”

“Oh, wait, are you a – “

He chuckled.  “Yes, I am a rabbi.”

“Oh – that’s –”

“I don’t like to say so in my profile.”

A little sin of omission?  Okay, I thought, I’ll cut the clergy a little slack. “Actually,” I said, “I think it’s a big draw.” I gave him a flirtatious smile. Could I be a rabbi’s wife?  I’m Jewish enough. I go to High Holiday services, eat matzah on Passover. I’ve got the designer suits, flats, pearls; I’ll attend his shabbat sermons -- as long as he lets me edit them.  He’ll throw me sexy glances when 90-year-old Rivka’s nose-honking interrupts his torah portion.  A blessing on my head, mazel tov, after all these single years, right?

Then it hit me; I realized that he had officiated my nephew’s bar mitzvah. “Oh, my God, you’re that rabbi!  What a small world.”  I remembered ogling him while he blessed my brother’s first-born son at the bima; I thought he was the hottest rabbi I’d ever seen.

“I have something to tell you,” he said. “Especially since I think we’re going to see each other again.”

“Okay.”  I was happy to hear we were going beyond a latte.

“My wife died.  Six months ago.”

“Six months –”

“But I’ve sat shiva, I’ve mourned. She wanted me to find someone new.  I’m ready.”

“Well – that’s – good,” I forced a smile.

Six months.  Every sensible human knows that losing a spouse, or even divorcing one, requires a healing process of at least a year.  I knew that.  Red flag waving right in front of my face.  But I just slapped it away.  As I so often did.

I did it in my marriage which had ended over five years prior.  But the red flag I swatted away was not noxious like lying or cheating; it was about chemistry.  From the get-go, our bond was virtually platonic.  I reasoned: I’ve had lots of passionate sex and look  where that got me.  So, I dove into friendship and safety, and, fortunately, after one of the  few times my husband and I made love, we conceived a son.  Living two blocks away from each other until he went to college, we’ve raised the kind of compassionate, big-hearted, humorous soul I’d hoped to find in a partner.  And that’s what I was looking for when I gussied up to meet the man who came out on our first date as a rabbi.

On the second date, the rabbi asked me how exactly I sell a movie or TV show.  I gave him the abbreviated version, and then, of course, it came:  He pitched me the book he was writing – about two Lithuanian brothers who emigrated to the Lower East Side and made a fortune selling cream cheese.  “It’s the next Succession,” he exclaimed, “but Jewish!”  Did I think I could sell it? 

 “If I knew what I could sell,” I replied, “I wouldn’t be renting an apartment with cottage cheese ceilings.”

He laughed.

“What I wouldn’t give for cream cheese ceilings,” I said.

He laughed again; said he loved a woman with a sense of humor.

Then I asked him something important to me: “Do you like to hike?”

“Not in the least,” he said.  “Can’t do dirt, rocks, or bugs.”  Damn, I thought, my hiking partner fantasy dashed.  I was afraid to climb up our local mountains alone. (“Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!”)

After an Italian dinner where he ordered the Bolognese (not only eating pork but mixing it with Parmesan), he walked me to my door and asked if he could look at my ceiling.  I turned on the light, pointed up, but he threw me down on the sofa.  Kissing, fondling me. This man was way too eager; horny understandably.  But six months a widower.  I expected more from a rabbi – more self-control, more respect.  Maybe I was more Jewish than he was.  I told him it was too soon for me to have sex; we’d have to know each other better.  He threw back a sultry smile. “Until next time,” he said, slamming my door behind him.

“What’s the problem?” Vivian checked in the next morning.  “Clergy like to shtup too.”

“His wife died six months ago.”

“Too soon.  Red flag. ”

“He said he’s ready.”

Vivian sighed.

“What?  I like him. We’ve got major chemistry.   Our conversation totally flows.  Not like the last dude who could barely put a sentence together.  He’s super well-read.”

“I hope so.  What’s next?”

“I’m going to ask my brother about him.  He bar mitzvah’d my nephew.”
                  “Unreal.  How did his wife die?”

“I didn’t want to ask so soon.”

“Ask.”

“You’re dating Dr. Evil?”  My brother asked, with a chuckle.

“What are you talking about?”

“He’s buried two wives.”

“Two?  I only heard about one.”

“There was one before the one he divorced.”

“But – but he didn’t kill them, did he?”

“Who knows?” My brother laughed. “The last wife died after back surgery.  She was recovering at home, and the word is he gave her a few too many oxys with a wine chaser.”

“Hmmm, okay,” I managed, closing my eyes because I was seeing red.

“Did he tell you how he met the dead wife?” My brother continued.

“Not yet.”

“He was counseling her and her husband.  Instead of saving the marriage, he married her.”

“Oy,” I exhaled. 

Time to step away from this un-holy man.  But did I leave him?  Did I bring up his double widower status?  No.  The sex was a religious experience.  After four dates, I spent the night.  The rabbi’s ceilings were smooth and so were his moves.  He lit candles while I put on The Blue Nile, a romantic band whose hit “Tinseltown in the Rain” was a perfect song to make love to on a rainy night in Culver City.  Especially with his hopes for a Jewish Succession.

We were romantic, super-charged.  In the wee hours, our pillow talk was electric.  We would discuss a wide range of subjects: From love and hate in the book of Genesis to the horrifying few years that Bob Dylan went evangelical.  Never an awkward silence.  Imagine how I could enrich my teaching, my screenplays.

What could go wrong?

I decided to ask the big question: 

 “What exactly happened to your first wife?” He darted angry eyes at me. “I know you divorced the second and the next one –”

 “She slid into bed one night and didn’t wake up,” he hissed. “An unexpected heart attack.  She’d had a congenital murmur that wasn’t supposed to be serious.” 

“I’m sorry,” I said genuinely.

He added, “I guess I shouldn’t have insisted we do the nightly jog.”

I blinked.  I batted away the flag.

“I have something else I’d like to tell you,” he said.  “In truth, it’s only been four months.”

I blinked again.  “Four months?”

“Yes, since my last wife died.  I was just so excited to meet you, I didn’t want to miss out.”

Flight or flattery?  I chose the latter.  No doubt his confession reflected his desire to move closer to me.  And that night, the sex was more passionate than ever; his blue eyes locked with mine as the Blue Nile crooned: “Stay close to me.”

A few days later, while home revising a screenplay, I received an email from him.  He confessed he was still grieving over his third wife; he wasn’t ready for a relationship.  He said in another scenario, I’d be his perfect match. But it was not to be. He likened our relationship to an electric blanket: On my side, the heat was dialed up to a twenty; on his side, his blanket was at a ten. If he weren’t grieving, we would be on the same setting.

I expected a much more profound dumping metaphor from a man of the cloth. 

 “At least I got out alive.”  I told Vivian into my Bluetooth.  I laughed.

                  “Stop being glib.  You’re hurt.  Now what have we learned?” she asked.

                  “When I see the first red flag, even cocktail size, I need to step away.  ‘Step away from the asshole, Patricia,’” I barked, like a pissed-off cop.

                  “Not funny,” she said.

                  “Okay, seriously,” I said, “I’ve learned that when a guy has only been widowed for a short time, you will inevitably be the rebound woman.”

                  “What else?”

                  “Do not use conversations about the Shmear Mafia and Dylan’s born-again phase to replace personal questions about who I am.”

                  “Because…”

                  “Because it shows he really doesn’t give a shit about me.”

                  “Correct.”  Vivian continued. “Can you just stop letting them in so easily?  Open your fucking eyes, sweetie.  Not your legs.  Stop being so desperate.  Unless, of course, you enjoy dating losers and want to end up alone.”

“I’m losing you!”  I lied.  “Love you!”  I ended the call, stopped in 405 traffic, stewing.  Then I received a text from Vivian.  Siri dictated: “I hope I’m not too hard on you.”

“Never hard enough,” I dictated, gripping the wheel.  I was downright sad.  I could have really used a hike, but my mind flashed to rattlers and bobcats, so it was a no-go.

I couldn’t wait for my screenwriting workshop that afternoon where I could lose myself in my eight graduate students and guide them through drafts of their screenplays.  Aside from hiking with a partner, I have two other happy places:  Writing and teaching.  Ironically, I was questioning a young man, who only wore 70’s rock t-shirts, board shorts, and flip-flops no matter the season, about his use of the term “red flag” in Achilles’ dialogue in his rehash of a Trojan War epic. “Did you look up the etymology?”

“The eti-what?” he asked. 

I sighed and said, “As writers, we must be word-obsessed, we must have enquiring minds.”  The students looked down, probably at their Insta feeds.  “Did anybody here wonder about the red flag mentioned in the Trojan Horse scene?  It didn’t sound a little too contemporary?”  Students shrugged. “Does anyone know when the term ‘red flag’ was first used?” Every student tapped open a new browser.  “Do not Google it now. I will tell you.”

 I stood up and squeaked a red Sharpie across the white board, drawing a red flag. “Red flags were first used by warships in 1602 to indicate their sea men were preparing for battle: ‘Heed the red flag or risk your life!”  I shouted.  A few students managed a grin.  “In 1777, the red flag warned of flood; then a red flag was posted as a warning to stop a train due to an obstruction on the tracks.  Later, the red flag was waved by communists to protest the working-class struggle against oppression and inequality.” 

I was getting heated, striding around.  The Trojan writer scowled but the rest of the class howled and punched their fists in their air.  “Professor’s on fire!” one yelled. Breaking into a sweat, I continued: “Over time, the red flag morphed into a metaphor: Caution when proceeding in relationships.”  My eyes watered. “Whether we see it in war, fire storms, or lying dickwads, danger lies ahead.”  I received whistles, applause.

“Professor, are you crying?” a female student asked. 

I dabbed my eyes with my sleeve. “Tears of joy,” I covered, then concluded: “And so that is what research is all about, my beloved screenwriters.  Know your words.  Be an expert in all things you write about.”

In fact, my red-flag expertise did not come from a search engine.  (Please pause for my psychoanalysis.)  As a young girl, I huddled in my canopy bed and read and wrote stories to escape the red flags wielded by the first man in my life: My TV producer father, known as the Man in the Big Black Boots, would pound around the floors, scaring the crap out of me.  Little pudgy, freckled Patty, in braids he insisted on, would sing “I’m Just a Girl Who Can’t Say No” to packed parties of his Hollywood friends.  I did a mean “You Can’t Get a Man with a Gun,” too. ( If only.)  In girls school-issue saddle shoes, I plodded forward, batting away the flags, while my dad would ask: “An A-? Why not an A?  How are you going to get into Radcliffe?”

Dad was the Willy Loman of Hollywood, and my heart went out to him.  I evolved into a hybrid of Dorothy of Oz and Anne Frank.  I didn’t want to believe there was a man behind the curtain even though I saw him with my own eyes; I was convinced that “people are really good at heart,” even while Dr. Evil was banging down my door.  I surrendered to Dad because I could never win the fight.  Inevitably, I’d kneel before him and massage his feet just to see the smile return to his face.  He’d sigh with relief and tell me I was his best girl. Imagine how loved I felt when I got nominated for an Emmy.

And now back to my encounters with the Big Red Flag, or as I will come to call it: Big Ass Red Flag, whose apt acronym is BARF.

Looking up at my cottage cheese ceilings with my glass of red that night after my emotional class, I let myself grieve over another “gone guy.”  I assessed my mistakes and vowed next time to look beyond the pecs and the baby blue eyes.  See who is really there: A man without a moral compass who is only interested in satisfying his own needs.  I deleted my JDate profile and set a hiking date with my best L.A. friend, Natalie. 

On the Westridge trail, wide enough so we could talk side-by-side, I caught her up on my latest love-loss.  “I know you’re disappointed,” she said, huffing uphill, “but I envy you.” 

“Why?” I asked. “You’ve got the best husband I know.” 

“Because you’re not married to him.  He’s so needy, wanting my attention all the time.  I can’t even go to the farmers market without him insisting on carrying my bag of tomatoes.”

“That sounds nice to me,” I said. “You’ve got a partner who is there for you.” 

“And yet,” she replied, “sometimes I feel lonelier than you can ever imagine.” 
“Really?  I’m sorry,” I stopped, handed her my bottle of water.  She sipped. 

“Can you talk to him?” I asked. 

“What do I say? ‘Get out of my face and I want a deeper connection’?” 

A rustle from the grass terrified me and I grabbed her hand. “Was that a snake?”

“Probably,” she said, “but they’re more afraid of you.  And despite the latest news you texted me, I’ve never seen a mountain lion up here in all my years of hiking.” 

“With my luck,” I said, “The one time I come up here alone is the day I get mauled by a cougar.” 

“Speaking of cougar,” she laughed, “How’s that young IT guy who was hitting on you at school?” 

“Not interested in the youth.  Anyway, I’m taking a dating break, licking my wounds.” 

“Good,” she said. “I can tell the hubby that you’re carrying my tomatoes.”

“More than happy to,” I said, marching in step with her.

During my six-month hiatus from dating, Vivian flew in for a week.  Walking along the shore of Will Rogers Beach, I thanked her for her visit.  “I just needed a break from the snow, and from Ron,” she said. “Don’t think marriage is easy.  It’s not for the faint of heart.” Here it is again, I thought, the long-married wife lecture.  She continued: “ You have no idea.  You’re looking for July 4^th, but I promise you marriage is July 5^th, every day.” 

I stopped and kicked up wet sand. “I’m not looking for July 4^th!  I know that passion dies, Vivian, but it’s got to be there to begin with.  You were there, you remember why my marriage ended!” I fought back tears.

The waves crashed and water surged over our bare feet.

                  “I remember,” she said.  “I’m sorry, sweetie.”

                  We hugged for a long time, our feet sinking deep into the muck.

On June 1^st, the alert I had set six months ago dinged. Driving to class, Siri dictated: “Back on the bronco, bee-atch.” Her humorless drone gave me a smile.  The dating blackout was over, and I was ready to dive back into the cyber haystack to find the needle.  Who was the great guy out there just waiting to meet me?  I switched things up and narrowed my demographic, signing up for The Right Stuff, a dating site for Ivy Leaguers and lesser institutions like MIT, Duke, Johns Hopkins, and Berkeley.

“I’m pulling up to Starbucks,” I told Vivian a few weeks later. “At least this one wore a shirt in his primary profile pic.”

“Who’s this smarty-pants?”

“He’s a criminal law professor, TV legal pundit, divorced dad of two tweens. Super sweet on the phone.”

“I want a full report.”

 “First flag, I flee.” I ended the call.

Tall and dark, my date hailed from Boston, a Harvard Law School grad so we had Crimson in common, as well as a love of Sondheim and politics.  He pined for his TV legal pundit days, said he was still on the CNN list, hoping for a call.  Suddenly, I was his wife, picking him up from the news station, hosting dinner parties for his legal eagles. The rich conversations we’d have!  The papers I’d proof!  He leaned in, asked me questions about my work, my son.  His deep brown eyes shone with keen interest and enthusiasm.  He even asked to read one of my screenplays. 

On the downside, he did not like to hike.

When we met a second time, our connection was true, truer than what I’d had with the rabbi.  (Not saying much, I know.) The professor had a warm soul.  He asked me to open my dusty scrap book and tell him my life story.  He wanted to meet my son as soon as possible, and I had my first dinner with his kids on our fourth date.  He led with his heart, spilled out every fact about his one divorce.  There were no jump-scares, no dead spouses or cheesy TV series pitches. 

Soon I was spending several nights a week at his Palisades home. I noticed he was drowsy a lot; he didn’t initiate sex very often.  He was happy watching true crime in bed, then rolling over and going to sleep.  Was this a repeat of my marriage?  Or his middle age?  In the past, this behavior would have ignited my insecurity; but he spent long hours teaching; and he held my hand so tight, said he was the luckiest man in the world.  I’d never had a partner with a big heart like his.  July 4^th is only once a year, right?

 I had the summer off from teaching, so my son and I spent a lot of time at his place.  I loved watching him throw a baseball to my boy.  “Not a bad arm for an old guy,” my little shortstop teased.  But the professor had to stop, sit down;  he endured constant back pain from a college football injury. “That’s why my mom took me out of Pop Warner and bought me my first glove,” my son told him. “I’ll be back with the perfect Tylenol-Advil combo,” I said. “No, really,” my beleaguered beau said, “That stuff doesn’t work, I’m fine.” 

At the time, I lived by the “thou shalt not snoop through thy lover’s medicine cabinet.”  But I was a woman on a pain-killing mission and yanked it open. To say it looked like a pharmacy is an understatement.  Rows of empty prescription bottles were lined up in plain sight. I figured he popped a pain pill now and then.  And the labels were old; he must not have realized that the pharmacy recycles those pesky orange plastics.  I slammed the cabinet shut and found a full bottle of Tylenol in a drawer.

I offered to massage his back, which relieved his pain.  As he dozed off, he effusively thanked me.  For being me; for cleaning, for cooking, and, once, combing lice out of his daughter’s hair.  He complimented my beautiful “heart-shaped face,” which was eerily the exact same phrase my dad used to describe my mom when he first met her.  I felt safe with this man; older and wiser, I no longer perceived stability as a synonym for death.  Our electric blanket temperatures clocked at the same number, and it felt good. 

 When my best pal from college, Maura, a child psychiatrist married to Ted the trauma surgeon, invited me to visit her while they summered in Wellfleet, I was excited to bring the beau along, with our two tween kids.  We headed for the Cape, eager to grow closer and share experiences together in a place that we once called home. 

“Isn’t he great?” I said giddily to the girlfriend I was so happy to see.  We had just walked in.

“Patty,” Maura said, “your boyfriend just cornered me and asked me to write him a prescription for oxy.”

 “What?”  I blinked.  There’s a jump-scare for you.

“And when I said no,” she continued, “he asked Ted.  Who also said no.”

“Oh, no,” I said.  My shock and sadness veered into a deep despair.

“He’s out on the balcony pouting,” she said. 

If it weren’t for non-refundable tickets and my longing to spend time with my old friends, we would’ve jumped on an earlier flight.  The rest of the week was a disaster.  Agitated, presumably going through withdrawal, he turned cold and mean.  Every day he left messages with a handful of doctors, called and barked at pharmacies, but nobody would renew his prescription.  The red flags multiplied like cockroaches that you step on but only come back in droves. I was drowning in a ferocious red sea that never parted for a moment of hope. When he demanded a massage and I refused, he moved the only fan in our non-air-conditioned rental into his daughter’s room and slept in the other twin bed.  Meanwhile, my sweltering son, sleeping on the couch, appreciated the cold washcloths I put on his head.  I counted the days until we returned to LA and I could break up with him.

“Now what have we learned?” Vivian asked.  I had read her the vitriolic email he sent after I broke up with him: “Nobody will ever love you the way I do,” he wrote. “You’ve blown your chances for true love, and you’ll never have it again.  You’ll regret it for the rest of your life.” 

“I’m shaking,” I said. “That letter kind of threw me.”

“That’s what he wants, sweetie,” Vivian said. “To punish you because he’s a narcissistic, needy drug addict, and you couldn’t put up with him.”

“But he’s in pain –”

“See what you do?  You’re doing Daddy again.  You rushed into another relationship, blinders on, and didn’t heed the warning signs.”

“Hold on, there were not obvious warning signs.”

“Love bombing you?  Empty pill bottles?”

“Affection I’d been longing for.  The labels had expired!”

“Excuses.”

“I’m losing you,” I lied and ended the call.

On our way up Temescal Canyon, I assessed my new break-up with Natalie. “I acknowledge I made another bad choice,” I said. “But here’s what I did right,” I said. “I went for a man who was truly interested in me and my son.  He asked questions, sang love songs to me.  Made me smoothies.”

“Sounds hella boring,” Natalie said.

“Exactly.  July 5^th, and I embraced it.  It wasn’t about rabbinical-level passion.  With this one, I was happy with the balanced calm of everyday life.”

“Balance?  Calm?  Maybe because he was stoned out of his mind,” she said.

“Ouch,” I said.

“No, I agree, Patty, this one was a big step up,” she huffed, climbing the switchbacks behind me. “You’re headed in the right direction.” 

Not convinced that my next choice would ascend the evolutionary ladder from Neanderthal to Homo Sapien, I stopped my search and took a year off.  I lost myself in work.  A man may not have been blowing up my phone with heart emojis, but my teaching evals came in, and my students were singing my praises: “Patty is the bomb!” “Give this woman a raise.” “Patty goes beyond to make our scripts great.” “Most caring professor ever.”  “An absolute story genius!”  Then good news from my manager: “They want a second revision on your pilot,” he reported. “That means they want to make the thing.”  The contrast between my professional heights and my personal abyss was not lost on me.  For all my students and Hollywood knew, I was a happily single woman, rolling in men and dough, gazing up at a smooth ceiling.  I was tossing my beret like a giddy Mary Tyler Moore; I had it all together.

In fact, I had had it.  Once and for all, I vowed I would evolve my own troglodyte brain.  I ramped up my gym visits, sweated more, beat myself up less (no more Mr. Wrongs to  endure).  I contemplated my misjudgments.  Being alone was liberating.  I spent my first Valentine’s Day feeling awesome that I didn’t have to blow my hair out, much less blow a “Mr. What Are You Thinking?”  At the risk of sounding like old SNL’s Stuart Smally, I was finally feeling “good enough.” 

Eager for another breakthrough, I laced up my hiking boots and drove to the Westridge trail.  I looked up at the fire road ahead.  The wide stretch of dirt disappeared around a rim of dense brush. My emboldened mind said: “You can do this.” I took a deep breath and stepped onto the gravel.  I hit my stride and reached the dense brush.  It rustled, and I stopped.  A rattlesnake slithered out, only a yard in front of me. “Shit!” I gasped.  I froze.  Ignoring me, the snake wound its way across the wide path. I backed away.  Fast.  Nearly tripping as I turned and sprinted back down the hill, my heart pounding.  Not stopping until I chirped at my car and jumped in, locking the door. 

One step at a time, I told myself, driving to the gym.

  A year later, my pre-set alert chimed, and Siri droned: “Never say never.”  I relaunched my hunt over the holidays; I’d see what miracle Chanukah would bring.  I jumped from the Right Stuff to Match.com.  Surely, there were men who were not drug addicts, who did not demand massages, and did not kill their wives. 

Back online I went, and, lo and behold, I matched with a swarthy, silver fox, a handsome musician, singer, actor.  Fully clothed in his profile pic, he fixed a dramatic selfie gaze; curiously, he was wearing headphones.  I surmised he was giving a visual to his singing and voice-over career.  We exchanged emails, sharing our love of cinema and New York City, his hometown.  We agreed to meet for coffee on a Saturday morning.

Mr. Headphones was waiting for me at an outdoor café, hunched over in a vintage peacoat, baggy jeans, and well-worn boots.  A promising sign I’d finally met a hiker.  A small army satchel sat by his side. The chemistry between us was instant, and the conversation flowed.  When the waiter arrived, my date said we were just having coffee. 

“That’s fine,” I said, “I prefer to cook at home anyway.”

“Can’t wait for you to ask me over for dinner,” he said.  Too fast.

“My last girlfriend couldn’t boil an egg,” he said. 

“Can you?” I asked, much bolder now.  

He chuckled, “I can boil ‘em, I can scramble ‘em.” This gave me a chuckle.

I asked: “Do you hike?” 

“No but take me and I’ll try.”  That’s some headway, I thought.

On our second date, we met at my local Italian joint known for their martinis.  He wore the same outfit, same bag at his feet.  I enjoyed hearing about his journey as a featured extra on a super-hit sit com; he was still aiming for better roles, and though he was over sixty, I encouraged him.  “Talent wins out,” I said. “If there’s a will, there’s a way,” I squeezed out the bromide, but I believe it to this day.  He asked about my work, my family.  And something new: He made me laugh. His old stories about working on-set with a crew of crackpot jokesters amused me.  He was witty and could turn a phrase.  After an hour we finished our martinis, and the waiter was eager to take our order. “You aren’t hungry, are you?” my date asked with a “say no” stare.  I blinked. “No,” My stomach growled. “I don’t need to eat.”  I had scarfed up two rolls with butter, so my calorie count had maxed out for the night anyway.  He pulled out a debit card and paid for the drinks.

He walked me to my car, and I asked where he was parked.  He said he had taken the bus; he didn’t have a car right now.  I asked him where in Santa Monica he lived, and when he told me, I offered to drive him home; it was only a few miles away.  On the way to his place, we sang, harmonizing to “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes” on my Spotify.  He thanked me for the ride and leaned in for a chaste embrace. Relieved and intrigued, I watched him walk towards the side of an apartment, his bag over his shoulder.

For the next week, we texted and exchanged our favorite songs. His became more romantic. Declan O’Rourke’s “Galileo.” Brian Wilson’s “Love and Mercy.”  Then downright heated: The Boss’s “I’m on Fire.”  I sent him back Judy Garland’s “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love.”  Suitably on fire, we agreed to meet for New Year’s Eve. I picked him up in the rain, and we went back to my place. We drank a bottle of bubbly and danced through midnight, and our first kiss was explosive.  We were meant to be together, we agreed.

On New Year’s morning, we laughed again.  There was a fierce wind banging against my old bedroom windows. “It’s the Santa Anitas!” he hollered, “They gonna gallop right in here!” This threw us into fits of laughter.  Once we were out of bed and I’d made breakfast, he put on a serious TV commercial actor face and held up his coffee mug for an invisible camera: “This is some good coffee,” his voice basso.  His deadpan cracked me up. 

New Year’s Day blew by, and then another day or two.  He wasn’t making any moves to leave.  It was feeling like July 5^th already, and I knew it was too soon.  I needed a breather from the hot and heavy; I needed space to assess.  There were no red flags yet, but I wasn’t ready to wave the white one either. 

“I’m going to drop you home today,” I told him over coffee.  He was still

wearing my extra bathrobe; he was busting out of it, but he looked sexy in a silly way.

                  “Home?” he asked.

“Yes, to your apartment. I need some time to myself,” I said.

“Oh, no, that ship has sailed,” he said.

My stomach dropped.  “What do you mean?”

“The guy who was letting me sleep on his patio, he’s so glad to be rid of me.”

“Weren’t you paying rent?”

“Nah.  He said I could sleep on his balcony until I got on my feet.”

“Balcony?  As in outside?”

“Sure, I have a sleeping bag.”

It hit me like a ton of bricks.  Or in keeping with the metaphor, a football field-size

red flag: I was dating a hobosexual.

Suffice it to say, my romantic life was not moving in the right direction.  My partners were still devolving –  from Mr. Right Now to Mr. Wrong to Mr. Hell No.  For the three weeks that it took me to kick him out, he waited for me to return from work so he could sit in my car, inside my closed garage (“great acoustics”), and practice singing for Karaoke night.  The used Levis and leather bomber jacket I bought him at the Salvation Army looked hot on him, but watching him croak out Joe Cocker at the Gaslight, gyrating with the mic stand like Jagger, made me want to cry.

That night, after Karaoke, I was longing to drop him off at his balcony.

“This isn’t going to work,” I told him as we pulled into my garage.

He took my hand.  “You’re just scared.  Our love is so intense.”

The next night, during MSNBC, I said, “I can’t take care of you. This is not on my list of preferences in Match.com.  I’m looking for an equal partner.”

“Please, I beg of you,” he implored during MSNBC. “Don’t make me leave. I have nowhere to go.”
                  “That’s not my fault,” I said. “I need you to go.”

“But I love you,” he said. “I’m going to get a national commercial, and then I’ll be back on my feet, and I’ll be able to take care of you.”

I blinked.  I got up, pulled a pillow and blanket from my hall closet, and set them on the couch.

“Fine,” he sneered.

One of my deepest regrets about this abject low point in my dating life is that I involved my son.  At 26 he was a stand up, stable young man, coordinating care for the mentally ill.  (Timing is everything.)  He also coached baseball and was in fighting shape. “What do you need, Mom?  Anything,” he said.

“I need you to come over and kick out the hobosexual.”  We managed a chuckle.

“No problem.”

“I’ve booked him a motel room for three nights and ordered an Uber.”

“Mom. You don’t have to do jack shit for this guy.”

“I know,” I said.

“Always leading with your heart, Mom.  But that’s what I love about you.”

I waited for my son in the alley in front of the garage where the boyfriend would sit in my car and wail “Maggie Mae” at the top of his lungs.  And let me add the chilling detail of his peeing in a jar he brought along with him, so he didn’t have to interrupt his rehearsal. 

My son and I walked into my apartment where the boyfriend was drying the coffee mugs.  He loved throwing a dishtowel over his shoulder to prove he was doing his part. 

“My mother would like you to leave,” my son told him, standing stalwart like a bouncer with his buff arms behind his back.
                  “Now?”

“Yes, now.”
                  “I’ve booked you a room for three nights,” I said, standing close to my son.

“Where?” he sneered.

I wanted to joke, “The Beverly Hills Hotel,” but his stare was already daggers.

“My mother doesn’t have to spend money on you, but she did.  Now it’s time to go.”

“Your mother is a liar. She promised me things.  She doesn’t keep a promise.”

I turned away, wanting to run out, but he was blocking the door.

“I will wait here while you pack your things,” my son dead-panned. “I would appreciate it if you would do this right away because I have other things I’d like to do with my day.”

“You’re a con!”  The hobosexual hollered at me.  He stormed off to stuff his items in crisp new Ralph’s grocery bags.  He had used his old ones to line my garbage bin.

I slinked out.

Later, I apologized to my son and swore I would never let this happen again. 

“I’m so, so sorry.  I don’t want you to remember me this way.”

He took me in his arms.  “Oh, Mom, I will only remember what an amazing mother you are.”  Then he suggested I stay with my brother for a few days.  “Just in case he decides to come back.” 

“I’ll change my locks,” I exhaled against his shoulder.

And change myself once and for all, I thought.  I thought I’d made major progress but, clearly, I had more work to do.  I was still running from snakes on the trail but not from men carrying all their personal belongings everywhere they went with the hope that they’d sink their fangs into some wimpy woman’s heart and slither into her home.  I surrendered to footing the co-pay for psychotherapy. (Trust me, I’ve had plenty of it; but what happens when you feel smarter than your shrink?)

Every week, I dove into the mire of my childhood, my daddy issues, my mother. The two females in the family, we were close; I loved her madly and sympathized with her challenge in keeping right the boat constantly rocked by my mercurial, demanding dad. Her life preservers were patience, compassion, a career, Salem Lights, and gin on the rocks.  Whenever I’d lament my dating woes to her, she’d say:  “You don’t need a man.  You’ve got yourself.”  No doubt she enjoyed her widowhood.  Not a crier, I finally shed some tears in therapy, discussing the memoir I’ve wanted to write since my first series of heartbreaks in my twenties: “I’m going to call it ‘Missing Men,’” I told the shrink, wiping my eyes. “Because they always go missing, and I always miss them.” 

By the next Valentine’s Day, I was feeling lighter, freer; whatever loneliness I’d felt had vanished.  In my screenwriting workshop, a young woman was struggling to write a rom com that wasn’t cliché.  “You’ve got to ‘pour the old wine into new bottles,’ as Baudelaire said,” I advised her.  “The hundred roses, boombox at the window, riding up on horseback schtick – been done to death.”  I said: “How about a simple line or two where he owns his shit and apologizes?”  “I love that!” she exclaimed, scribbling down the note as if it were pure genius.

Six months later, back on the cyber-search, I pulled into Starbucks for a first date.

With no eye shadow, in a loose-fitting shirt, I sat down across from him with our lattes.  From our introductory phone call, I learned he was a wealth manager.  He expressed his amazement in learning that scripts are written. “Wow, I thought it was just actors ad-libbing,” he said.  I was no longer looking for an obvious connection.  On a different tack now.  He seemed kind, energetic, and in his primary photo, he is waving from a hiking trail.

Instead of leaning in and asking the first question, I waited for him to speak.  He tilted his head as his eyes scanned me from head to waist.  The table stopped his perusal, so he looked up at me. “You look thinner in your photos,” he said. “But, I mean, for your age, you’re still pretty hot.”

I let that sink in but only for a beat.  Then I stood up.  “I have to go.”

“Are you kidding me?  What’s your problem?”

“Actually, I’m walking away from one.”

I headed out the door.

“I came, I saw, I fled,” I told Vivian on speaker.

“Good girl.”

“No, that’s just it.  I’m leaving that little girl behind, the one who’d do anything for Daddy to get his love.  I’ve pulled the curtain back, Vivian, once and for all.”

“I’m listening.”

“Just like Dorothy who had to face the con man behind the curtain, I’ve recognized the con woman in myself – the one who pretended to be stumbling upon inappropriate men.  I was stumbling, yes, but I was choosing them, all along.”

“Tell me more.”

“It’s on me, it always was.  It was my choice to hang in with a man even after I knew he wasn’t right.  Nobody had a gun to my head.  Well, maybe the Rabbi did when I was asleep.”  We both laughed.  “But seriously, no more excuses, I’m owning my part.  I’m going to be more patient and hold myself to a higher standard.”

“Amen, sister,” Vivan said.  As if on cue, we ended the call.

I rushed home, thrilled I wasn’t teaching that day. I had handed in my latest script, so my time was free and clear.  I hit Temescal Canyon, sipping my water bottle, breathing hard, as I climbed up the trail.  I was stepping over real obstacles now, rocks and mud, rather than creating them for myself.  I didn’t feel lonely on the empty path; instead, I was exhilarated by the scent of the dry chaparral and the crunch of my boots in the gravel.  When I reached the top of the mountain, I caught my breath, gazing down at the Pacific shimmering in the high sun.  I exhaled.  The brush rustled next to me.  I turned and looked.  It rustled again.  I marched past it and up the trail with a smile.

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