The year of the Hoe

There was a good solid year where Tinder was my go to for meeting people. I was working 70+ hour weeks and I was lonely, drinking myself into a depression. So naturally when I’m at the bottom, I tend to dig a little deeper. And boy, did I sure dig myself into a Tinder hole.

I had just gotten out of a lame 2.5 year relationship, I met this guy on POF (Plenty of fish). It wasn’t an exciting relationship and it was holding me back. My career was thriving and I wanted to roll with that to see where it would go. After about 6 months of me being “my best single self”, the drinking habit I developed was getting worse and the loneliness was starting to eat me alive. I downloaded Tinder, and boy oh boy did I Hoe it up.

I went on so many dates and I really can’t remember them all. What I do remember are the ones that I shouldn’t have gone on. Here is one of the most embarrassing Tinder moments I can’t get out of my head.

We’ll call him Ryan, because I cannot remember his name. *insert face palm*

So at first Ryan and I were hitting it off, good conversation, not boring, and he was attractive, muscles for days on this guy. A couple days after talking we decided to hang out. I was supposed to meet him after a work function. I had talked to him the night before, so when he didn’t respond in the morning before my work, I figured he was busy and he would respond a little later. I was wrong. I finished my work and went to the place where we were supposed to meet. Me being an antisocial person I sat in my car and waited. I still hadn’t heard anything from him. Being a Tinder date, I hadn’t given him my phone number yet, because I hadn’t met him. I decided to go in and see if he was there. He wasn’t, so I went back to my car.

After sitting there for 30 minutes and not getting any responses, I decided to call it and just go home. I was disappointed but I mean I had a whole lot of guys I could choose from. I know, being ghosted is not a new thing, but that’s not the end of this story.

A few months pass, and I am still on Tinder. I come across a new profile for him, but it is indeed him. So I thought just for fun, I was going to message him and call him out on him ghosting me. He tells me an elaborate story about having been at the lake with some friends and that he was thrown in and broke his phone. He couldn’t remember his login for Tinder so he had to make a new one and couldn’t find me. This should have been my red flag, but the sad, drunk and lonely don’t care about that, we just want company.

So we decide to give it another go. I (being an idiot) give him my address so he can pick me up and we can go get drinks. When he arrives he is way hotter than his pictures, so I am happy this is happening. Then he opens his mouth, and he has a lisp. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that it’s a bad thing, just not what I was expecting from this big beefy guy. He legit sounded like a toddler. I was giving him the benefit of the doubt, so we get to the bar and we get some drinks and sit down. He won’t stop talking about a video game I have never heard of, and he doesn’t want to talk about anything else. So this is my tipping point, I have no car, I am stuck here with this guy AND he knows where I live. So I decide to do what any rock bottomed, depressed, lonely person would do, and get wasted since he’s paying for it. We end up going to another bar and I am toast. I tell him to take me to my house or I am going to puke.

I don’t know what kind of hoe magic I had in me, but I did not puke in the car. I start running to my house and I’m almost to the door, I start projectile vomiting on the side of my house, on myself and all over my shoes. This guy is just so confused and worried, so he takes me inside and gets me cleaned up. I start puking again in my bathroom, He is saying something about leaving and going home.

I start crying and telling him to stay and get me water. Ryan does just that for about an hour. The puking subsides and I am ready to sleep. I make my way to my bed and Ryan tries to get into my bed. I proceed to yell at him and tell him to sleep on the couch. So he does.

In the morning I am feeling like death, I go to get some water and I am surprised to see that Ryan is just patiently sitting on the couch waiting for me to get up. Embarrassed, I mumble a good morning and he jumps up and comes over to me and asks me what we should have for breakfast. Me, being my workaholic self, has nothing but condiments in my fridge. He looks disapprovingly into my fridge and says he’ll be right back and leaves.

I am in shock and I really don’t think he’s coming back. So I shower and get ready for the day. Then I hear a knock on my door, I guess he’s back. I get the door and he’s there holding bags of groceries and he says he’s going to make me breakfast, how can I say no to that. He makes us a feast of bland food, while I sit at the table (no, he didn’t want my help) and wait for the meal to be ready.

We eat and he talks and I am reminded that at this point I am just using him for his company. I start to feel bad, because he’s obviously having a good time if he is still here right? So I make up some excuse that I need to do some work and I ask him to leave. I could tell by his reaction that this was the only date we’d be going on, and that was fine. He leaves and I never hear from him again, which is probably the best outcome for both of us.

I would like to say this was my breaking point, but sadly it was just the beginning. This one has always stuck with me and is just a funny thing to look back on how ridiculous I was. Lessons were learned in my Hoe year, and I don’t regret them.