Deception

Back in early January, having made a New Year’s Resolution to meet new people, I put a personal ad online. Over the next couple of weeks, assorted responses trickled in, some that I responded to and others that I ignored. One response was quite interesting and intelligently written, and the writer had an MBA and also a law degree. My ad had mentioned that I was looking for guys in their 20s, and he seemed to have more professional experience than a 20something, but his response didn’t mention his age. I wrote back, thanking him for the response, mentioning some other things, and asking how old he was. He replied with some more details, responding to some things I’d said, and toward the end of the message — perhaps the second to last sentence — he mentioned that he was 38. Oh, I thought. That’s too bad, he’s older than what I’m looking for. Well, maybe he’d still be a good person to get to know, even if I don’t want to date him. But I never wrote back, and I completely forgot about him.

I was looking forward to having dinner tonight with Penn, the 24-year-old guy with whom I’d been chatting and talking on the phone for the past few weeks. He called me this morning so we could figure out where and when to meet. But before we started discussing the details, he said, “First, there’s something I need to tell you.”

Oh, god. He’s going to tell me he’s fallen in love with someone.

But nope.

He told me:

“I’m 38.”

Um.

Wow.

Not only that, but he’s the 38-year-old guy who’d responded to my ad back in January.

Holy shit.

What could I say? I was stunned.

I know — you’d think that with all the time I’ve spent chatting with people online, this would have happened to me before. But it hadn’t.

Here, according to his explanation, is what happened. He was new to chatting. He was never expecting to meet anyone — he was just there to chat, to see what this thing was like. One day he saw my profile, my information looked interesting, so he opened up a window with me to chat. We did. He said he was 24 and so forth. After chatting for a while, he told me that in his short time chatting, he’d never had such an intelligent online conversation before. Eventually he had to go, so I told him he could e-mail me. He did. A week went by before I responded, and then I did I included a link to my photos and so forth, which he hadn’t seen.

According to him, it was at this point that he realized who I was. He remembered me as the guy whose ad he’d responded to, and who hadn’t written him back when he’d learned he was 38. He wanted to tell me, but he wasn’t sure how I’d respond, and he really was coming to like me.

We began chatting more and more, several hours a night, but he was hesitant to move on from there. Finally we decided to talk on the phone, so we did, and for the next couple of weeks we talked almost every other night. He kept wanting to tell me, but he kept putting it off.

Until this morning.

As I said, I was stunned. He’s not 24, but 38. He’s not a recent college grad at all. Certain things make sense now. Like the fact that for so long he resisted talking on the phone. Like the fact that he doesn’t have a picture. Like the fact that in the past, while chatting, I’d say, “I’ve really started to like you,” and he’d respond, “Listen, you don’t know me…”

This morning he told me that I had every right to be mad at him, that he’d been a jerk, that he was mad at himself too, et cetera, et cetera. And he said he knew this was completely self-serving, but would I still like to have dinner with him tonight, and it would be on him.

Here’s the thing. I’m very age-conscious. Theoretically I’d like to date someone who’s within 3 or 4 years of my age. I want someone whom I can consider my peer, and I’m not really attracted to older guys — I’ve certainly never desired to date someone 11 years older than me. But I’ve found that friendships with older men can be very valuable, as those men have “been there” and have experiences and stories that they can share with you.

So this is strange. I’ve been chatting and talking intently with this guy with whom I’ve seemed to click, and yet it turns out he’s 38. And yet, despite his age, we’ve had such interesting conversations. He told me on the phone this morning that he was surprised I hadn’t figured out he was older, because of the things we talked about and because of his insight into certain topics. And this is interesting in light of what I wrote a week ago about thinking that I might not meet someone I clicked with until well into my 30s. And now I’ve had these great conversations with a guy in his late 30s. So what does this mean? Do I want a guy who’s physically in his 20’s but emotionally and intellectually older? My gosh, wouldn’t we all? Then again, the guy lied to me, so how emotionally mature can he be?

I went back and forth. I told him, I can’t have dinner with you tonight. Then I told him I’d like to. Then I said no. Then I said, let’s do it anyway. No expectations. (Now that I think about it, this explains why there was a silence on the other end several nights ago when I said that we should try not have expectations when we met up.)

You’re reading this and you’re thinking, what the fuck? Are you nuts? Be mad at him! Don’t have dinner with him. Don’t have anything to do with him!

But you know what? I told him I’m mad, I told him I’m stunned. (But maybe not enough — he told me I should be angrier than I was reacting.) I don’t want to date him. I’m just curious to see what he’s like. We’ve had good conversations. What if he’s good looking? Maybe I could at least get good sex out of it. And most importantly, if I don’t have dinner with him, I’ll have no plans for tonight.

Isn’t that lame? I’m having dinner with him for lack of anything else to do?

And he lied to me.

You know, I should call him back and say I’ve changed my mind. (I told him I might.) Then I could find something incredibly lame to do tonight, like go to a bar alone and wind up meeting nobody. Or I could see if any other friends are still planless tonight. Or I could come back here (I’m at my parents’ house for the weekend, taking care of the dog while they’re away) and rent movies and listen to Wagner and chill out alone.

I really should keep my dignity.

But I’m curious.

I don’t know.

Update

About 20 minutes after I finished this entry, I thought, what the fuck? He lied. There are tons of guys out there, guys who will be honest. Why should I give this one the opportunity to meet me? So I called him back and said I couldn’t have dinner with him.

I may not get to satisfy my curiosity, but at least I’ll feel good about myself.