My search continues apace. My eight finalists became three rather quickly, as I determined that the other five and I were unlikely to be compatible.
Last night, one of the three rather abruptly excused himself from the field. I'll include the salient e-mails, sent between 10:00 and 11:30 last night. He had sent his photograph, which wasn't thrilling, but was certainly within the bounds of "doable" to me. His words were what was most important, and they were wonderful. I returned with several of my own photos. I brought up that old joke about how friends help you move, real friends help you move bodies... (work with me, it was salient to the e-mails leading up to it.)
Him:
I desperately need to get to bed ASAP, as I'll be getting up at an obscenely early hour tomorrow, but I'm afraid I've got to address something with you first, and I think you know what it is....
I'm either about to place my foot squarely in my mouth and render myself the biggest horse's ass in all of Christendom, insulting you mortally in the process and necessarily detonating our nascent friendship, or....
No, let me just stop right there and ask you point-blank:
[Adulteress], is there something you need to tell me -- something that you should have told me right from the start?
Me:
Not that I can think of. Was my moving bodies jest poorly received?
Or was there something else? I've got a decent sense of the absurd, so try me. :)
Him:
All right, I'm just gonna come right out and say it, and if I'm wrong you'll hate me forever and I won't blame you, and we'll just agree to take our leave.
The shot of you [on vacation] looks remarkably....masculine. Are you a transgendered individual, or perhaps a cross-dresser? (And of course if you are a genetic woman, I've just insulted you profoundly.)
Just tell me truth. Please?
Me:
I was born a female, and intend to stay that way. I'll gather that you felt no attraction, and that's fine, but perhaps you might have just said that, rather than impugning my honesty and gender.
Him:
And more regrettable still, I've managed to insult you beyond belief in the process, for which I offer my sincerest apology.
My my, this has been a productive evening, wouldn't you agree?
Oh well, I suppose it could have been worse. I'm not sure quite how, but it's possible!
I truly wish you the very best, and much success. You're an amazing person.
Okay. So let's analyze this for a minute. I spent a few minutes thinking "geez, I always thought that I was more femme than butch. Maybe I've been wrong all along." And not that there's anything wrong with being trans. I'm just...not.
I showed the photo in question to various friends this morning, (without the context that it was a suitor, just saying that someone thought I looked transgendered in that photo), asking for total honesty. None of them, including the transman or gay guy, thought I looked like anything less than a "lovely, genetically and culturally female woman". I'm shaped more like a fertility goddess than a supermodel, for sure, but I made that clear in the original ad. There's no adam's apple, facial hair, or anything like that.
The general consensus is that he was a tactless ass, and I'm better off knowing that now than later.
I'm trying to not be all self-conscious about this, and I will likely retire that photo from the stuff I send to potential suitors. Gah.
Wow, that's awful! It's especially interesting because he knew his way around the english language, yet was so inept at conveying those thoughts in a tactful way. Actually he should have just moved right along and not said anything if you weren't his type. It always surprises me how much freedom the internet gives people to be rude. Don't get me wrong, I love the internet; it's just strange how it allows someone to do that. And I'm sure, as made clear by your friends, he had no idea what he was talking about anyway. It's not you, it's him haha.
ReplyDeleteThanks for joining my blog! Love yours as well. Don't worry about the guy. You can't please everyone and who knows what kind of moron you wound up being contacted by. There's still a lot of us who are real men and not scared to say hi to a woman such as yourself. you sound real, genuine. that's a very sexy combination to those of us with a brain. ;)
ReplyDeleteBTW, no. Craigslist is a bust in the town that I was in. I'm not the bar scene type. thanks for the input, however.
Whoah - colossal fail. I feel like I should try in some way to show some brotherhood with this guy and try to explain how and why men blunder into this kind of situation... making reference to our failings as communicators and our different perspective on personal boundaries...
ReplyDeleteBut in the end it would have been quicker if he'd have put a mouthguard in and say "I think you look a bit like a dude".
Anyway... are you going to sleep with him?
midMANdle: Thanks. I'm tempted to participate in HNT just so I can show a boob or something to the world to prove...something. Maybe next week.
ReplyDeleteJim Young: I'm sorry you had such rotten luck, and thanks for the kind words. I am pretty reticent about exchanging photographs with people until I have a reasonably good sense of them, but he fooled me until then.
Crazed-n-Amused: You got me, there. I keep hoping that by being an example of someone trying to be honest as well as kind, I'll positively impact the interactions I have with others. Like the butterfly effect or something. :) I'll keep trying.
The Adulterer: Even if _I_ weren't turned off by his tactless assitude, I don't think he was interested in me. I don't see that working as a pick-up line, anyway, at least, not in the w4m sections of Craigslist.
The Muffin Fan: Precisely. And at this point, I'm comfortable that he was not only a jerk, he was a WRONG jerk!