The Unsuitables

As my readers know, I am a good sport about Lubbock. I love the big sky, the kind neighbours, and the unapologetic expressions of frontier culture. However, there is one crucial area where Lubbock has let me down. I have alluded to this issue in the past, but West Texas has proven to be a land of epic romantic failure. Allow me to offer some illustrative anecdotes. This will likely be the first in a series.

Tonight started out as a high-calibre Lubbock evening. It began with a potluck at my house, with my friends from the vegetarian dinner co-op. We had lots of laughs and talked about strategies for using all the chili peppers from the CSA shares we'll start receiving in a few weeks. After dinner, I headed to campus for a meeting of the Secret Movie Club. The Secret Movie Club (don't tell anyone) consists of a group of faculty members and their cronies who make use of an auditorium on campus that is equipped with a fancy high-definition projector. It's "secret" because technically we aren't supposed to be in there, but we are a lawless bunch of cinephiles. Each week one member is responsible for picking the film, but they don't tell anyone what it is, so it's a lovely surprise every time. When it was my turn, I showed the Blu-Ray of the newly restored Metropolis. Other evenings have featured The Terror of Tiny Town, among other classics. Tonight it was Black Narcissus, everyone's favourite insane nun movie. After the film I went to the gym, then stopped off at the grocery store. While I was shopping, a guy at the store noticed my t-shirt, and he asked if it was a joke about the heavy metal band Iron Maiden. I held my breath for a moment. Allow me to explain.

Last year, when I was in Los Angeles, I purchased a t-shirt with this design on the front:

I found this hilarious. See, the font is based on the logo for Iron Maiden:

But instead of Iron Maiden, it's Ingmar Bergman, creator of many a depressing Swedish art film. If you're not familiar with Bergman's filmography, it is heavy on bleakness. In his masterpiece The Seventh Seal, a knight returning from the Crusades plays chess with Death. No, really. So, here we have a t-shirt that combines heavy metal with Swedish art cinema. It's incongruous! Ha ha! Let's all be witty together!

When I acquired this shirt I had a bemused moment where I thought that if I ever met a guy who got the joke, then he would be a promising candidate for the Tapdancing Aviatrix Experience. So, when grocery store guy expressed this inkling of recognition, I wondered if he might have potential. We discussed it further, but it turned out he was only halfway there - he recognized the font, but hadn't heard of Ingmar Bergman. Then he tried to crack a joke about John Lennon's murder (!), but referred to Elton John instead. I found this inappropriate on several levels, so I departed the store without securing a date.

Now, this may not seem like a big deal. Don't I know that there are people starving in the world, and my biggest problem is that a guy doesn't fully appreciate my t-shirt? Really? Well, what you need to understand is that this is just the latest in a stream of encounters with the unsuitable men of Lubbock.

On Friday evening I had yet another excellent Lubbock outing - I went to the First Friday Art Trail, a monthly event where all the galleries in town have an open house. I got myself dolled up and went out with some friends to admire paintings and drink local wine. As we were walking through one of the galleries, my friend Renee gestured toward me and accidentally hit a guy who was standing right behind me. She apologized to him, but the reason this happened is that he was following me so closely he was very much in my personal space. I turned around and he introduced himself. Now, his description of his professional status - a chemist at Texas Tech who works on counter-terrorism - seemed quite promising. He informed me that I was gorgeous, which is also a good sign, but alas, he was rather inebriated. I was forgiving about this at first, since the local wine is not to be trifled with, so we had a chat for a little while, and even exchanged numbers. Ok, I thought, maybe I'll hear from him sometime.

Later that evening, when my friends were driving me home from a late dinner of enchiladas and margaritas, I received a text message from the chemist that read as follows: "2 first names.. One is followed by Dr?" People, whatever you do, don't drink and text. For readers who don't know me, both my first and last names can function as given names. My interpretation of his message is that he can't remember which name comes first, but he has a vague notion that I have a PhD. This does not impress me. C'mon, man, remember my name.

Ok, two unsuccessful encounters in one weekend is a bummer, but surely this is an anomaly?

Wait, there's more. Since moving to Lubbock I have tried many dating websites, but with limited success. This January I joined eharmony.com in hopes of meeting someone suitable. I realize that eharmony is part of a right-wing conspiracy (more on that another time) but I figured I should give it a shot. Now, to be fair, it did allow me to meet one guy who was very nice, but there just wasn't any chemistry. Other than that, it has been a nightmare. For example, I recently met a guy who seemed suitable on paper - he's doing an MFA in photography (artsy! educated!) and we seemed to share a number of interests. I met him for a coffee date. This date was so unsuccessful that every time I think about it, I remember yet more reasons that it was a disaster. I met him after returning from New Orleans, where I was speaking at a conference. I had given a paper on 3D movies, and I mentioned this early in the date. He immediately started to tell me all the reasons that he thinks 3D movies are lousy. Emotional intelligence, anyone? I just told you that I do research on 3D movies, so now might not be the time to complain about how you don't like the glasses. I felt like getting up and walking out at this point, but I wanted to be polite and give him another chance. Silly me.

He mentioned that he is from Sweetwater, a nearby town that is famous for its annual Rattlesnake Roundup. The Roundup is a festival where like-minded people get together to hunt, kill and eat rattlesnakes. Now, you would think that if you came from a town with such a tradition, you would have interesting stories to tell. Alas, you would be wrong. I asked him if he had "ever had a rattlesnake burger," and he replied that rattlesnake doesn't taste very good. Instead of following that up with a description of rattlesnake meat, like an interesting person would do, he instead offered a boring story about how he enjoys pork sandwiches. I kept trying to extricate a rattlesnake anecdote from him, but to no avail. Any sensible person would realize that the very utterance of the word "rattlesnake" automatically makes a story more exciting, but this was lost on him. He said something like "It's a fun festival overall" and I attempted a witty retort along the lines of "I imagine the rattlesnake community doesn't agree." He then proceeded to explain to me that rattlesnakes don't think like that. I was momentarily dumbstruck - did he think that I was anthropomorphizing reptiles? Did he think that I believed that Diamondbacks all get together for community meetings, produce a monthly newsletter, and keep in touch over facebook? Things weren't looking good.

I tried to change the subject, and mentioned that I was working on ideas for my graduate course next fall. The course is called "Planes, Trains and Automobiles" and it is about the relationships between transportation and communication technologies and the cinema. I mentioned something about how many nineteenth century films are about trains. He jumped in and made the fatal error of trying to impress me with pronouncements about film history. He began by saying that in the early days of cinema, they didn't have any editing. Now, there is a way in which this is true (it's not really, but I can understand why one might think that), but the kicker was the following statement: "They didn't edit their films because they didn't have the technology for that." I thought, "The technology for film editing? Like, scissors?" To be clear, the problem is not that he isn't a film historian, the problem is that he says dumb things, and is persistent about it.

Stay tuned, there are lots more where these came from.