BEFORE: On Thursday, I was relatively insane. Entirely on edge in anticipation of the coffee date. I got very little done at work and I was very distracted. In fact, I have a lengthy post written yesterday as a monument to my lunacy. Out of deference to whatever shred of public image I maintain here, I will not be posting that.
DURING: So, the coffee date. We had a drink and talked from 5:15 to 7:30. Then we went to a nearby restaurant for sushi (her preference). After the meal, around 9:30 she commented that I looked tired. At that time, I realized that I was tired and that I was pretty bored. So things ended right after that, me driving us back to her car to drop her off, a "nice to meet you" and we were done (once I remembered where she'd moved her car to – I blame tiredness and idiocy).
AFTER: While the date went okay, there won't be a second date and I made up my mind on that sometime during dinner. I don't want to go into too much detail. Let's just say that it wasn't any one thing but rather an accumulation of many mild-to-medium things and hints. She made a few medium strength mis-steps, and while these weren't fatal individually or in and of themselves, combined with other, smaller points the sum total was just not good.
The "tired" comment was a small trigger for me. Not for her perception or anything, but rather the fact that I was tired and bored at 9:30 when normally I'm wide awake and rarin' to go. If I were at board games, I wouldn't know 9:30 had passed until it was 10:30 or 11:00. The single thought: "Wow. I really am tired." woke me to the fact that I wasn't finding our date to be very interesting or engaging.
I know I made some mistakes, and at points I wasn't as responsive or alive as I could have been, but I don't think I made any major errors. If I had asked for a second date, I'm pretty sure she would have said yes. I just didn't want one.
I give myself a small kudos for recognizing that it wasn't going to work. I feel like a few years ago I would have been willing to overlook all the signs and just run with it because I could, see where it goes. But now, last night, I was cognizant enough to recognize that something wasn't right. It was more intuition than anything, at least during the date. If you asked me point blank at 9:25 how I felt, I would have said something wasn't right but it would have taken me 5-10 min. to really pin it down (which I did after the date).
Part of me is sad that things turned out the way they did. I had high hopes for this one. (Which should serve as a reminder to me not to get my hopes up, but I will – every time.) She seemed like a nice person from our communication. She is a nice person. (Beats one of my two "exes" right there.) Just not nice enough, perhaps? (Which is a horrible thought since she was very nice.)
All-in-all I'm glad this happened. The date was not a train wreck and I got to brush up on my dating skills. The conversation was okay and I don't think I made any big blunders, just smaller ones from which I can try and learn. I feel a little silly that I was as stressed as I was this week. Turns out I needn't have worried quite so much. But then if I didn't worry like that I wouldn't be me, would I?