The truth is I wasn’t supposed to be in Istanbul in the first place. I refused to listen to my world-famous chemical engineer dad’s words of advice who told me to major in engineering. Instead, I graduated with an English degree from UC Berkeley, and with no immediate career prospects, got a job driving a bus.  I crashed the bus into a parked car the first day of work and was fired on the spot. I took the next job that came up, which was teaching English in Istanbul

The city, with a population of six million at the time was filled with men—all staring at me: young, old, handsome, ugly. All this male attention felt exciting at first when I walked down the street, like I was a famous and glamorous movie star. As I began learning Turkish, I understood the awful things these men were saying, and wanted them to leave me alone. But no matter what I did, no matter how modestly I dressed, they harassed me constantly, like swarms of malaria-infested mosquitoes.

One time, while coming home in a taxi from a party at 2 a.m., four Turkish policemen, machine guns slung around their shoulders, stopped me, and forced me into the back of their car. They asked what I was doing out so late and threatened to take me down to the station for a virginity test. I sat resolutely, squashed between two of them in the back and said, “I’m an American. And an English teacher.” They were so excited, they made me sit there with them practicing their broken English. I was not amused. When they let me out and I got to the front door of my apartment, I unadvisedly screamed every Turkish curse word I knew. But my pronunciation was so bad, I doubt they knew what I was saying.

Another time, I was riding on a bus to Butterfly Valley, an alleged pot smoking paradise for backpackers on the Aegean Sea. A man across the aisle from me offered me a cigarette. I said no, but I could feel his eyes on me when I turned away and knew something bad and disgusting was about to happen. And there it was—his flaccid penis, which he pulled out of his pants.  I screamed and ran to the front of the bus, trying to explain to the driver in my broken Turkish what just happened. “There’s a penis there, and a very bad man,” I said pointing to the man. The driver told me to sit in the front . “No, that won’t do,” I said.  So, the driver pulled off the road and the man got off, the bus. For the rest of the trip, the whole bus sat in silent terror, as I—now out of my mind—lectured everyone about what a horrible time I was having in Turkey. “ I’m an English teacher. There’s a lot of dirty men in Turkey. I’ve had a lot of problems.”

No one said a word the rest of the 20-minute-trip, except, of course, for me.

None of that stopped me of course, from going to Butterfly Valley where I spent the next 72 hours, hanging out with the other backpackers,  getting stoned, floating on my back in the waves, chest arched to the heavens in an ocean so warm, salty and buoyant, it seemed impossible to sink, and then later on sneaking off to make out in the bushes with a  Scottish boy named Sammy with brown hair as soft as corn silk and the bluest eyes I’d ever seen.

Not long after that trip, Lesley and I were walking one night down a cobblestone street to go to a Reggae disco when a group of teenage boys passed by, and one of them grabbed my butt and ran down the street. I was in no mood for bullshit since the scariest thing  of all had just happened to me two weeks prior, and I was recovering with a hard yellow cast around my arm.

I tore off after the boy, chasing him at top speed for blocks, screaming every swear word I knew at the top of my lungs into the empty city streets.  I wasn’t scared about what would happen if I caught up to him. All I cared about was throwing myself on top of him—all 5’5” and 120 pounds of me—on top of him and killing him with my bare hands.  When I came back empty-handed, the boys’ friends quietly skittered off. My friend, Lesley, laughed and said, “Well, I guess he’ll think twice before doing that again.”

I looked at the boys toddling off down the road .I looked back at Lesley, and said, “Yep, you got that right,” I said, and we kept on going to the disco.

The post Sex in a Small Town: Scary things appeared first on Valley Voice.

“Do you want to meet for karaoke?”

“Yes, yes, yes!” I write back.

That’s my dream first date, too.

We agree to meet at a place called the Purple Rose. He texts shortly beforehand to say he has two missing front teeth and asks if I want to reschedule.

“No worries!” I write back. I don’t see how he’s going to fix his teeth in the 12 days before I leave town.

“What are you wearing?” I text him in the Lyft, realizing I’ve completely forgotten what he looks like.

“A ball cap, jeans and t-shirt,” he says.

I snorkel to myself. That describes everyone I know in Three Rivers.

I walk into the bar and tap him on the shoulder. Sure enough he has two missing front teeth. He’s drinking a beer and I order a  Merlot. We search for songs.

“What are you singing?” I ask.

“I have such a structured life, I never sing the same song twice,” he says.

“I have such an unstructured life, I always sing the same songs,” I say.

It’s loud and hard to talk. Occasionally, I twist my body away from him and belt out the lyrics to someone else’s song. I check his reaction.

“Don’t hold back,” he says.

So I don’t. I lean into him, and say, “You know what I hate? I hate when other people tell me to smile. People have been telling me to smile my entire life.”

“You do have a melancholy face,” he says.

“Well,” I say, not wanting to argue the point. “You’ve got to work with what you’ve got.”

His song comes on next—Love is a Drug.  He leaps into the air, doing the best middle-aged white man’s version of a punk rock break dance I’ve ever seen and croons his heart out. I’m delighted and sing along with him. My song comes up next, “Come as you are” by Nirvana.

I lean against the wall, close my eyes, and pretend I’m a rock star in a recording studio. No one else seems to hear me, but Patrick claps uproariously for me.

“Come on, let’s go somewhere quiet and talk,” he says.

We meander around the streets, and I feel like I’m in a Woody Allen film.

“What were you like in college?” I ask.

“I was a geek. I was too afraid to talk to the cool, pretty girls.”

I smile, and for no real reason tell him, “There was a guy who lived on my floor in college with pet rats. They seemed nice enough, but I was too afraid to pet them.”

We go into the bar, which is dark and quiet inside, and covered in medieval-style wall murals. “Wow,” I say. “This is amazing!”

“Shhhh,” I think I hear someone say. I might be imagining this, though. Patrick orders a beer and I get another wine. There are two long-haired guys next to us dressed in loud, screaming 70’s shirts. “I love your outfit!” I say to one of them.

This bartender and the rest of the patrons hush us again. I think they must be joking.  “What’s going on here?” I ask Patrick.

“This is a quiet bar,” Patrick says. “You can only speak in a whisper.”

“Really, that’s great! I’ve never heard of such a thing!”

The bartender raises his voice above a whisper, and says, “If certain people don’t stop speaking so loudly, they’re going to get kicked out.”

Patrick and I walk outside to the veranda, followed by the long-haired guys. “Did he just threaten to shut the whole bar down?” I ask.

“No, I think he was kicking you out,” Patrick says.

“This isn’t the first time I’ve been kicked out from a bar,” I say defiantly.

“Don’t worry,” one of long-haired guy says. “They’ll let you back in 15 minutes if you promise to be quiet. We get kicked out all the time.”

Patrick asks me about my family, and I tell him about my quirky, eccentric, world-famous chemical engineer dad.

“What’s your mother like?” he asks.

I sigh. It’s a long, sad story. I say the kindest thing I can think of. “My mom was beautiful. Absolutely stunning.”

My parents, both from New York, in fact, met right across the street from where we’re having a drink now. They met at a car accident—an ominous sign for thekr future. My dad thought my mom was beautiful and my mom thought my dad, a brilliant, young engineering student, was going to make a lot of money one day. They were both right and they both made each other miserable.

I change the subject and ask Patrick how he found this bar called the Burp Castle.

“A woman I was dating brought me here,” he says. “All the women I date are either crazy or boring. But you’re not crazy or boring.”

“Thanks,” I say.

Patrick asks me if I’m going to finish my wine. “I hate wasting food,” he says. “I used to be unemployed for a long time.”

I avoid pointing out that wine isn’t food and I haven’t wasted it yet. But I I don’t know this guy at all, and I figure it’s best to remain at least slightly sober. I slide  my wine over to him and he downs it like a shot.

“I’m starving. Do you want to get an eggroll or something?” I ask.

“Sure,” he says, “but I’m out of money.”

I shrug my shoulders. “I’ve got cash,” I say, feeling magnanimous and happy and hungry.

We don’t find eggrolls but end up at a Greek food stand instead. He orders lamb over rice and I get a gyros. I pay with two $10 bills, and munch on my sandwich as we head to the subway.

“You’re really brave, coming out to New York and staying so long all by yourself,” Patrick says.

“I don’t know about brave,” I say. “The older I get, the more I realize we’re all going to die. There is no such thing as safe.”

We’re taking the same subway home, two stops apart from each other.

“You really should move out here full-time,” Patrick says. “New York women have the best legs. You have really buff legs already.”

“Thanks,” I say.

“And I love your shoes,” he says.

“Thanks!” I say and we both sit there admiring my shoes.

For a moment, I wonder if he isn’t gay. Patrick suggests going out for seafood one night before I leave.

“Sure,” I say.

The train arrives at my station, and a voice overhead announces, “Beware of the closing doors.”

“Thanks for a great night!” I say to Patrick and leap out onto the platform and scurry up the steps to find my way home.

The post Sex in a Small Town: A Good Date appeared first on Valley Voice.

A lot of young guys who have no idea what they’re talking about, write to me.

One guy writes, “Hi, sexy.”

“Ick,” I write back.

“Ick?” he asks.

“Yes, ick is right. You haven’t read my profile. You’ve only looked at the pictures. You are making overly superficial judgements.”

“What are you looking for in a guy? Tall, dark, and handsome?” says the guy, who is tall, dark, and handsome.

“I’m looking for someone who reads what I write,” I say and delete him.

Then there’s Ronald, the realtor with a thick New York accent. I gush on the phone about how much I like the subway. “What do you like best—the crazies or the naked people defecating in public?” he asks

“There are naked people on the subways? Where do I go to see that?!” I ask.

He invites me to dinner, and I do a reverse lookup on his phone number, and see he’s lied about his age. He said he was 52, but he’s 62. When I confront him, he flies into a rage. “Time for you to get lost. Not taking crap from a below-average looking woman,” he says.

This doesn’t bother me. As a writer, I’m used to rejection. I once sent a story proposal to the Fresno Bee, and the editor called me personally to scream at me.  “This is a good idea, but you have so many typos, you got your own phone number wrong! I had to call information to find it! I am sending this back to you!” she shouted, as if the Fresno Bee’s garbage was too good for me.

Another guy from Sarasota invites me to the horse races. “I’m not interested in horse races,” I say.

“You’re too young not to have fun,” he says.

Patronizing, I think. “Just because I’m not interested horse racing doesn’t mean I don’t like to have fun,” I say.

Then, there’s Randy, the one who asks me to move in with him. The conversation starts out innocently enough. We talk about shoes and swimming pools.

My feet are hurting from walking so many miles a day.  I need better shoes. He goes online to help me find local shoe shops. I also want someplace to swim. He sends me helpful links to local swimming pools. He’s an IT guy in Vermont. He offers to drive out to meet me. “How far are you?” I ask.

“Five hours, but I don’t mind,” he says

“That’s a kind offer,” I say, but I don’t say yes or no.

He tells me about his 14-acre ranch and how beautiful it is.  We have some things in common. We both prefer pot over alcohol, love dogs, books, blues music, and hiking in the woods.

“Why don’t you move in with me?” he asks after a day of emailing.

I’m relaxing at home, tired from riding the subways all day, so I play along.

“What would I do for fun/work/friends in a place where I don’t know anyone?” I ask.

“You could do whatever you want. Write, do art—whatever. I make enough money,” he says.

I don’t know whether to be frightened or flattered. At age 55, the offer to be a “kept woman” on an idyllic Vermont ranch by a younger man ought to be flattering. But I’m a little creeped out.

I tell him I already live in a gorgeous place in Three Rivers. “I’m looking for more of a city experience right now,” I say.

That’s when he flies off the handle.

“Oy, I’m having flashbacks. You sound just like my ex-wife. You’re not going to make enough money to live in New York City. I’m a numbers guy. I know”

I flush with anger. Who is he to tell me what I can and can’t do?  He sounds like some men I’ve known.

“You sound like you’re getting a little worked up,” I say.

“I just can’t deal with crazy,” he says. “After a year, you’ll be screaming to get out of New York.”

I hone in on the words, “Screaming to get out”. If I’m not careful, I could be screaming to get out of a locked basement in his house. I lift my fingers from my keyboard and stop responding. But he keeps writing. I watch with morbid curiosity as he spins out of control, ranting and raving. Then he deletes me. Then he undeletes me. Then he writes, “I’m opening a good bottle of Spanish red wine. Sigh..wish you were here. Are you there?”

No, I’m not there. I delete him.

Then there’s Gregory, a young medic. We talk a lot. He asks me what I was like in grade school, in high school, as a young adult.

I write back, “In grade school, the kids were mean to me. They called me ugly and stupid. In high school, people began to think I was smart. In my 20’s I became a professional writer.”

In my 30’s I had some commercial success. In my 40’s, I met and married the man of my dreams and lost almost everything—my work, my sanity, my friends, my health. Now, in my 50’s, I’m trying to get it all back.

I don’t send him that last paragraph. That’s just for me.

“When was the last time you made out with someone?” he asks.

“It’s been about a year,” I write back before I can stop myself.

“Do you want meet on the beach and make out?” he asks.

I imagine meeting him days before I’m about to leave for home. I picture us in the ocean, the waves crashing over us—me making out with a total stranger I’ll never see again. It might be fun. It might be adventurous. It might be something new to write about.  But then again, he might push my head under water and drown me.

“I don’t know,” I type back. “Maybe I’ll meet you. Let me think about it.”

I think about it some more, and then I ask him my standard bottom-line question:

“What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?” I ask.

He takes a long time to respond. “I’ve never really done anything that bad. Maybe, I’ve pissed in public a few times?”

He’s asking me, as if I should know. And I do know. He’s lying. He’s done much worse things. We’ve all done unspeakably, horrible things, including, of course, me. That’s the nature of being human. We are all good and bad. I need to know the bad parts of someone before I can trust the good in them.

I decide this guy is too much of a risk. I switch off my computer, roll over in bed, and go to sleep.

The post Sex in a Small Town: The Men I Meet Online appeared first on Valley Voice.

But in a city of one million single men vs. the four single men where I live, I should explore my options.

My online dating profile sums up my life in Three Rivers. It reads,

“I know four single men. One’s an alcoholic. The other’s a drug addict. The other two aren’t interested in me. Of those two, one’s a womanizer and the other belongs to the Future Wife Beaters of America Club. I’d like to say I haven’t dated them, but I’ve dated them all.”

I get a lot of responses, including a hot, young firefighter who says, “That’s the best profile I’ve read.” “Thanks,” I say, but he doesn’t write again.

One guy says in his profile: “I’m from Wall Street. I cuss a lot. If you don’t fucking like it, don’t fucking text me.”

“That’s funny,” I write to him.

“What’ so fucking funny?” he asks.

I apologize, frightened he might reach through the computer and strangle me.

I agree to meet a guy named William for dinner two blocks from my NYC Airbnb. He’s my age and Jewish, the child of two Holocaust survivors. I think we’ll have something to talk about.

He’s dressed in a gray blazer, jeans and sneakers. He’s about an inch shorter than me and a bit nebbishy looking. But he has a nice smile.

“What are you in the mood for?” he asks.

“I don’t know. Anything, really,” I say.

We look at menus at three or four places. Each time I say, “This looks good,” he says, “Let’s keep looking.”

We zig zag up the street. I spot a young couple with a Great Dane and Golden Retriever puppy. I lower myself to the ground and gush over the dogs, letting them kiss my face and nibble my toes. I’m more relaxed now, maybe even optimistic. The air, after a light summer rain earlier, feels crisp and clean and cool.
William smiles and asks, “Shall we eat here?”

I study the menu in the restaurant and glance up. William is staring at me. I blink and look away. I look up again and he’s still staring, but he’s removed his glasses, his dark–almost black eyes boring into me.

I’ve been on a lot of dates, and I know this isn’t normal. It isn’t the look a man gives a woman he thinks is pretty. It’s the level gaze of a python staring at a rat dropped into its cage he’s about to devour.

I shift in my seat uncomfortably. Of course, I’m not a rat in a cage. I can get up anytime I want and leave. If this were a man on the streets staring at me, I could shriek, “Fuck off! Stop looking at me like that!”

But I entered this restaurant of my own free will. Now I’m not sure what to do. It feels impolite to make a scene.

I clear my throat and say, “This menu looks interesting.”

But William is looking at me, not the menu.

“How ya doing?” he asks in an ultra-thick New York accent, for added emphasis.

“Um, ok,” I say, laughing nervously. I look away again and finger my sunglasses. Maybe I should put them on.

William is probing me without permission—this sustained eye contact. People don’t look at each other like this unless they’re about to kiss or fight.

Finally, the waitress comes over to tell us the specials.

I point at a random item on the menu and say, “I’ll take this.” I want this date over with quickly. But William isn’t in a hurry. He orders two sets of appetizers for each of us—steamed spinach, Brussel sprouts and tempura fried cauliflower.

“So what do you do for work?” he asks.

“I’m a writer,” I say.

I realize he hasn’t really read my profile where I talk about my writing.

The appetizers come and I struggle to make conversation—anything to avoid those dark eyes again. He tells me about his 15-year-old daughter who isn’t speaking to him.

“It’s Father’s Day and she hasn’t even texted,” he says.
My heart softens. “Girls this age are assholes. Trust me. I was an asshole to my dad at 15. She’ll talk to you again.”

“She thinks everything’s funny now, but we’ll see who’s fucking laughing when she gets into the real world and how hard life really is.”

He sounds bitter, really bitter, like he’s wishing harm to his own flesh and blood. He doesn’t ask about my family, work, or interests. He only wants to know what gym I joined and when I work out. I’m evasive in my answers. I never want to see him again after this.

I struggle to make conversation, trying to avoid those dark eyes again.

I ask how his parents survived the Holocaust. “Were they in hiding or in the camps?” I ask.

He squirms in his seats, like he’s ashamed. “They hid in the latrines. But I don’t want to get into that.”

His parents lived with rats in the latrines. William with his dark, dark eyes seems a bit rat-like to me. These are not nice thoughts.

I’m picking at my food. The steamed spinach is the first bad meal I’ve had in New York. “Do you want my spinach?” I ask.

“Actually,” he laughs, “I’d like your cauliflower.”

The cauliflower is delicious and I’m still picking at it. But I slide it over to him. The waitress tells us the dessert options.

“Say it again, but in English,” William says, making fun of her Russian accent.

When he goes to the restroom, I tell the waitress we’re ready for the check. When William comes back and sees the check, he says, “I guess it’s getting late.”

I plunk my Amex card down, and he lights up. “You’re getting this?” he asks.

A wave of revulsion washes over me—the idea that not only did I have to endure this awful date, but that he thinks I’ll pay for it is almost too much to bear.
“No,” I say firmly. “We’ll split it.”

He laughs a little and puts his card on the table next to mine. “I miss the old days with those Amex commercials on TV.”

I stare at him blankly and don’t bother to ask what he means.

I’m tempted to look at his receipt to see how much he’s tipped the waitress. But it feels like cheating, like looking at someone else’s discarded cards at the poker table once the hand is over.

We walk out into the night, which has grown hot and humid again. William, thankfully, doesn’t offer to walk me home, but instead asks where the subway is. I point in the direction opposite of where I’m going. He scuttles off into the night, and I—somewhat less afraid of rats on the street—walk myself home.

The post Sex in a Small Town: First Date in NYC appeared first on Valley Voice.

But I don’t care. I am HERE. In New York City. In the summer. I have bought an unlimited subway ticket, so I can ride around for hours, days, years if I want. I can’t believe I am here. So, who cares if I’m going the wrong way?

Still, I need to find a way to get from here to there. But where is here and where is there?

Someone suggests I download google maps. But I hate maps. I prefer to be lost and figure it out on my own. As my dad, Norman Lieberman, world-famous chemical engineer would say, “if you make enough of the wrong turns, eventually you’ll accidentally stumble on the right one.”

So, I want to make all the wrong turns first, so I can stumble across the right one. I want to get all the wrong moves out of the way.

I am going in the general direction—I think–toward Central Park. I am smiling big and wide and happy. No one else is smiling like me. There is everything and everyone here, including, now me. Across from me on the train, a masked Asian man reads the newspaper with a happy, smiling Border Collie at his feet. A woman with a baby in her lap sits on the far side of him. Squeezed in between them is a Rastafarian man about 10 feet tall, lighting up a joint.

Did I see that right? He’s lighting up a joint. In public? In the middle of the day?

WOW. I really did come to the right place. I try, slyly, to snap a photo of him. I look up and he is smiling widely at me. I reflexively smile back, then look away. Maybe not a good idea to smile at crazy people on the train.

I get off at 59th street in Manhattan, climb up the steps from the dark underground, and there’s a big sign saying, “Need Weed”. I walk up to the man near the sign and ask, “Do you mean you need weed or are you asking if other people need weed? Or, are you offering to share your weed?”

He laughs. “Uh, no, I’m selling weed.”

“Really?” I say, elated.

I see his buddy standing beside him smoking a joint. “Right here, in the middle of the street, you can sell weed?”

He looks furtively around, worried about some crazy lady making a scene.

“It’s ok. I’m from California,” I say, trying to explain. He looks unimpressed.

I don’t want to slow down his business, so I ask, “What have you got?”

He opens up a box of buds and rattles off some astronomical numbers. I am unimpressed. Where I live in Three Rivers, weed is basically free. I interrupt him during his sales pitch and ask, “Hey, can I have a hit?”

He looks at me startled, glances at his friend with the joint, who gives the thumb up. “Yeah, ok,” he says, and his friend hands me the joint.

I take a deep hit. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh.

The man’s name is Rats. That’s because he loves rats.

He pulls out a huge rat out from his jacket. I jump back, reflexively. The rat lies flat on his back for a belly rub.

Rats smiles and massages him with two fingers on his stomach. “They’re smart like dogs, but easy to take care of like cats,” he says.

Rats recommends I go on the Alice in Wonderland tour in Central Park. “You’ll love it,” he says.

I cross the street into the park, but I don’t find Alice in Wonderland anywhere. It must be that I am Alice and this is Wonderland.

Suddenly, the day is even more wonderful than it was before. I find a patch of green grass under a tree and lay on my back, looking up at the sky. The sky is robin eggshell blue with big fluffy rabbit shaped clouds floating by.

Hours later, I am back on the train, sobering up. So far, I’ve only asked women for help with directions. But without thinking, I turn to the young guy next to me, covered in tattoos and ask if I’m going the right way. Yes, but I need to take two transfers. He’ll show me. He just happens to be going the same way.

Oh shit. What did I just do?

I resolve to stay on the train when he gets off. Better to get lost than murdered. The train stops and he motions me to get off.

“No, I’m just going to go this way,” I say.

He motions harder. “No, you’ll just get really turned around if you stay on this train.”

I weigh the options. Is it better to be lost or murdered? My feet are tired, I’m hungry, my cell phone is about to lose the charge. Shit. I’ve lived long enough. What the hell.

I get off the train and follow him. Maybe he won’t rape and murder me. I am far too old for him. But maybe he’s an equal opportunity killer. Or maybe he’s just a nice guy. I am curious to find out.

We board the next crowded train together. He stands by the doors, and motions for me to take an empty seat. I am Alice in Wonderland and I’ve just slipped down a rabbit hole. God, what did I just do? First day in New York and I’m going to get murdered. I won’t be able to run very far or very fast in these flip flops. The only weapon I have is a ballpoint pen. I take it from my purse, click it open, and clasp it in my clenched fist. I eye him warily. My fate is in God’s hands now. Either I’m going to end up dead, or end up home.

Two stops go by, and he motions me to get off the train. “Take the F train to your stop,” he says.

I get off the train and he doesn’t come with me. I wave goodbye to him. He is not a serial killer! He’s a nice guy!

I make the transfer, get off at my stop and find my way home.

The post Sex in a Small Town: New York appeared first on Valley Voice.

My destined-to-fail dating career started at age 12 when I kissed a boy named Darren Gotter.  I feel ok using his real name because I’m sure he’s either dead, in prison, or a serial killer.

Darren Gotter had really greasy hair and smelled like dirt and oil and cigarettes from working on cars. My friends circled round us on the playground and goaded us on. Instead of “fight, fight, fight”, they shouted, “kiss, kiss, kiss.” He put his arm around my shoulders, which felt cold and floppy like the underside of a fish. And when he pressed his lips against mine, his tongue slid inside my mouth like a wet, wiggly worm. I jumped back in shock. My friends couldn’t stop laughing.

Then there was Guy Williams, the most gorgeous guy in the world. At the 7^th grade dance, he asked me to dance. Of course, I said yes. He led me onto the dance floor, and I froze.

“Do you know how to dance?” he asked.

“No,” I said.

“I’ll show you,” he said and gallantly led me through a series of steps to the pounding beat of “Macho Man” by the Village People.

I stood on the dance floor after the song ended, gaping at him. Now what. It wasn’t like he was going to ask me to marry him. So he did the next natural thing. He found another girl who wouldn’t freeze on the dance floor. Still, I smiled for the next three weeks solid.

Then there was Bobby, a pudgy boy with blonde hair and dull brown eyes who called and asked me to “go with him”.

“Go where?” I asked, confused.

In 12^th grade, my first real boyfriend was Andrew Wilson, with blonde hair and blue eyes I would later discover were the exact color of the Aegean Sea.  We had nothing to talk about in particular, but we kissed for hours on the floorboards of my aunt and uncle’s camper van, the stubble on his chin rubbing my lips raw.

When he broke up with me three months later, I called up my dad sobbing.  My dad, an expert chemical engineer, and most likely on the autistic spectrum, didn’t sugarcoat it. He told me the bitter truth.

“Well, Lisa, it’s just going to get worse from here.”

And he was right. It all went downhill from there.

Recently, I was married to the man of my dreams.   I was wildly, crazily (with crazy being the operative word) in love with him. He was smart, creative, and funny—a Wall Street mogul taking a break from his fast-paced stockbroker life—or so he said. We were a bright, happy, shining light wherever we went until we turned into an empty black hole.

One day, after 7 ½ years together, I went to the dentist and didn’t come home. Normally, I’d run home after all that scraping and bloody saliva dribbling down my chin. But that day, I called my husband and said, “I can’t do this anymore. I’m not coming home– ever.”

“What?” he said.

“You’ve been lying to me,” I said. “I don’t know what you’ve been lying about, but I know you’re lying.”

My husband begged me to come home and talk about it.

“I can’t,” I said. “I’m going to play dominoes.”

He called me in the middle of the game in tears, saying, “I don’t know why you’re doing this to me.”

I sympathized with him.  I said, “I don’t know why I’m doing this to you either.”

But the little voice that’s guided me—rightly or wrongly—my whole life was booming like a volcano about to explode: Get out now.

He begged me for the next year-and-a-half to get back together with him.

Two years after that, my now ex-husband was living in a bright shiny high-rise condo soaked in Florida sunshine with his ex-wife (the one before me) when the FBI broke down his door and arrested him for being part of a ring of con artists who bilked hundreds of people out of $16 million.

So now I don’t trust men. I don’t trust anybody– not even myself.

But the desire to mate goes on like the desire to eat or sleep or write or take a dump. It never ends.

So, I persist. In my 20s and 30s, the question was always, is he cute, funny, smart, fun. Now the questions are, is he married, a drug addict, a criminal, and if so, what kind of criminal? What kind of drugs?

I wish I could give everyone a lie detector test and run their credit scores before the first date. I want to get to the bottom line right away.

When I was in college in Berkeley, there was a street person called the “Hate man” . He wore lacy bras over his naked hairy chest, mismatched socks and high heeled shoes. He was a genius in human relations. He believed that rather than wooing potential friends and lovers with wit and charm, why not expose the worst side of yourself first so people knew what they were getting into?

I told this story to a guy on a first date recently.

“So, what’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?” I asked.

“Seriously?” he asked.

“Seriously,” I said.

After some hemming and hawing he admitted that once—and only once–when he was a waiter at a fancy café, he spat into a rude customer’s coffee.

We were drinking coffee.

What if he I said something not to his liking and he spat in my coffee when I turned around? It would have been better, I thought, if he admitted to killing a previous girlfriend or wife. That way he would have committed the heinous act only once, and the wife or girlfriend (albeit dead now) would not have to worry about their coffee being spat in.

“Um, what about you? What’s the worst thing you’ve done?” he asked.

“Uh, uh,” I said, searching for something meaningful to say, no longer interested in him.

“Um, I stole a candy bar once,” I stammered, lying through my teeth.

He furrowed his brow at me, unimpressed. He left shortly after that.

I dumped out my coffee and poured myself a fresh cup

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