That's the Smell of Fear

I was minding my own business, watching TV and contemplating tomorrow's errand run through town (something that, because of high gas prices, has become as precisely choreographed as any tactical military attack) when my mother called me on her way home from choir practice. It seems the ladies of the church have been conspiring against me. Well, that's inaccurate. It seems the ladies of the church have been conspiring for me, at least one of them. One of the ladies of my church believes she has found The Man for me, and she's given him my phone number. Yes, that odor that assaults you is the smell of fear....

From what I've been told so far, This Man sounds interesting, which is more than I can say for about 98% of the unmarried male population I run across in my day-to-day life. Granted, I have been given only the briefest of thumbnail sketches. For all I know, he's got a great big new axe, shiny and waiting to be used in the trunk/bed of his vehicle. You just don't ever know, do you? That's the horrifying part to me. You just don't know. I thought T. was normal, thought D. was normal, and look at how that all turned out. Fear, fear, fear...mind-numbing, house-cleaning fear.

Worse yet, it's not like I'll get to email this person first, use words in writing where I might stand a chance of coming off like a person with some fragment of intelligence, grace, or wit. No, no, no. I have to use the PHONE, a medium in which I will undoubtedly sound like a vacuous sixteen-year-old in need of an IEP.

Who knows whether or not this person will even call me? Right now, I'm voting for no because I'm too scared to vote for yes. I have already scrubbed every pot and pan in the kitchen sink, and I'm going to sit down and fold all the laundry that's accumulated. Hopefully, by that point, I'll be something like a sane person again, or at least as close as I ever get. I wonder if there are any copies of that brochure "So, You Want to Date an English Teacher" laying around anywhere?