“Ah, hobbies. Well, I just finished grad school…”
I nod at the young man sitting across from me in the small bar, sipping my hard cider and wishing I’d eaten more beforehand. My stomach is in knots. This is my first date in a long time. I tried dating while working the second shift but found it nearly impossible, and the loneliness that surrounded me and pulled me down had become comfortable after a while, even preferred. I didn’t know exactly what I expected from this tinder date on a profile where I had swiped right without reading anything because he had had one photo in his profile where he was with an owl, and I distinctly thought “Well, that’s interesting.” I wasn’t going in expecting anything; maybe just a new friend, maybe some company for a couple of hours if things went poorly. Out of all the tinder dates I’d been on in the past few years, sporadically trying out my luck on self-obsessed men who happened to be on the internet at the same as myself, he was the most interesting man I’d come into contact with. When he’d asked if I wanted to get drinks at a local bar, I hadn’t been expecting much, but I found myself excited and smitten for the first time in a long time. We went over the basics -what were our hobbies, tastes in alcohol, do you have any pets, what kind of movies do you like, how many siblings do you have, etc.
