Crazy Shabbos - One Way Underground

[This is Part IV of a yet-to-be-determined number of parts... Check out I, II, and III first!]

Before Groovin' left, he put on a classic show. Recalling the awkwardness of not understand Israeli society and their clothing, he began talking about a time he went with another friend of ours from high school to the Underground, a popular Israeli club in the middle of Jerusalem. This was well before Groovin' flipped out and became Mr. Good Boy... in fact, this is probably around the time he received a wonderful haircut in which a nickname was spelled out across the top of his head in big, raggedy letters. But I digress: Groovin', in all his 6'4+, disheveled hair glory, is standing in the middle of our living room describing his night at the Underground [try to picture this]:

So me and OnhYah go inside, and there are these huge Israeli guys wearing :::tight tight::: t-shirts and jeans, holding drinks or cigarettes and standing in the middle of the dance floor. OnhYah and I start to dance, shaking this way and that, fast and faster, and everyone's kind of staring at us. We start doing some moves, and nothing - all the Israeli girls are going toward these ugly, balding, fat guys in tight t-shirts and jeans, who are swaying a couple inches either way. Apparently, this is Israeli dancing... :::sway right, sway left, sway right, sway left::: Each passing moment, OnhYah and I get a bit more desperate, getting faster and more furious with our moves... but the Israelis are just :::swaying right, swaying left, swaying right, swaying left::: What the heck?!

At this point, our entire apartment is falling off the couches at Groovin'... and that might not have even been the best historical account of the night. DeepThroat had always been annoyed at the way one girl he went out with acted - and that girl was also a friend of KickBoxer. He asks Kickboxer what the story was with that, and before she answers, he does an imitation of their date (can't remember exactly, but you'll get the idea):

Hi! Hi. So, what are you doing? College. What are you going for? Major. Do you like it? Yes. What made you go into it? Because. Would you like to walk around? No. What do you like to do? Nothing. Would you care for a drink? No. Something to eat? No. Umm... would you like to go here? No. There? No. Want to sit here? Fine. Shall I take you home? Yes.

After a couple of hours which totalled about 10 words, he gave up and brought her home. At our apartment, he asked KickBoxer, "What happened? Did she not like me or something?" After asking a couple of times for the real answer, KickBoxer bluntly replied,

She thought you were a pompous jerk the second you opened your mouth.

Ouch.

DeepThroat was having a rough night. Though everyone did agree, the girl was wrong in her actions: No matter what your first impression (or almost any impression, for that matter) of someone is, you still must act civilly and with utter politeness - not rude as this girl had.

But DeepThroat was not the first, nor would he be the last, to get made fun of that night. The subject quickly became 'first impressions' - how much can someone judge about another after a first date - or even a second, third, or fourth. As mean as this sounds, most people in the room were in agreement: Sometimes, though on rare occasion, as soon as the other person walks into view, you know it's not for you. On the other hand, if it's "not your look", often times by going out with the person for a couple of dates allows you to appreciate how they look and dress, even if it's "not what you were looking for."

I personally am a firm believer that the longer you speak to anyone, the easier it is to become attracted to them - once you understand and appreciate someone more, you are drawn to their personality and it makes you enjoy their presence and smile; and therefore, their looks. It's also interesting to note how speaking to someone without seeing them skews your mental image of what they look like. Before Serach and I ever went out, our friend Jon (whom we met through) has described each of us to the other. The only problem is, Jon likes to play practical jokes more than anything else in the world. He described me to Serach as "ugly and scary-looking"; and he showed me a terrible picture of Serach in which she looked somewhat large. I knew she was short: 5"0, to be exact; and she knew I was tall, at 6"0.

[There is a relevance to Shabbos, you'll see in a second...]

As the first time we met was not supposed to be a date, I walked out of school wearing my OJ sweatshirt complete with hood, my Skechers slippers, and an old pair of pants - not exactly flattering in the cool November night. Serach was walking from the friend she was staying at, and had no clue where she was going. We'd talked a few times by phone, and as there was no thought of anything more than just meeting face to face because she was in the neighborhood, I figured I'd boo her, considering she didn't know who I was.

I scared the crap out of her.

But she quickly started laughing, and after a couple hours of shmoozing, I guess it somehow became a date... and the story continues from there. (No, I'm not doing the full version of how we met now... maybe another month.) And oh yeah - not that I care, but she was ridiculously skinny, weighing well under 100 pounds. Camera adds ten? Try fifty. [Yeah! I'm not really so fat... it's the camera! And mirror! And scale! And... shut up]

Anyways... back to Shabbos. Someone made a comment about judging people as soon as you meet them (not just shallow things such as looks). I recall a good friend of ours from Milwaukee telling me about her daughter's dating life. She felt it was unfair that people today won't even go out on a second date:

People are usually not that comfortable on a first date. What does someone have to lose by going out twice? I didn't even like my husband at all the first two dates. The third date I thought he was okay. The fourth, I finally came to start liking him... and now we're happily married about 25 years with 8 kids. It would kill the guy to let the girl relax a bit, show what she's really like?!

So when someone made a comment along the opposite lines, essentially saying they can know almost immediately whether they can be attracted to the person, Serach responded, to the shock of everyone there:

What?! If everyone would judge people by their first appearances, Ezzie and I would not be married! I thought he was ugly the first time we met - I thought he was scary-looking!!

And you thought DeepThroat had been having a bad night. Now, I knew what she meant by that statement, so I was standing behind her, cracking up. The rest of the room was rolling, HighVoice and Toast on the verge of tears from laughing so hard. BeardedMan was doubled over on the couch, and ExPres and Memphis' mouths were so wide open you could have flown an Airbus through. Serach tried to explain her comment, but it was waaaay too late - the damage was done, and there was no chance she was going to get an explanation out.

Thank God I understood she meant because of the hood and sweatshirt, along with scaring her out of her wits, or I would have been incredibly insulted. Instead, I was falling over laughing, trying my hardest not to knock anything off the table. Oy...

It's late, so you'll have to wait for the upcoming parts. Meanwhile, check out the Archives! Hopefully you'll find something interesting to read. [EDIT: Part V is up!]

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