If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

In an effort to not seem too eager, when should you brave the fear of rejection and make the call back? It was a Wednesday afternoon, and I was sitting outside enjoying the unseasonable 70-degree Chicago weather, while reading for class, when my phone rang. The caller-id read “private,” and I racked my brain trying to think of people I knew who would have a private phone number. The only person I could think of was, my alcoholic Asian friend, and I really didn’t want to hear about the latest guy she had slept with at the car dealership she works for, so I contemplated not answering. Just as I was about to hit the silent button, my overly nice/ annoying conscience jumped in and answered it. It was the bartender from last week. Meet Bartender Number 1. (I thought his name was Mike, so I had to look it up on my list in the back of my little red book. When I was wrong about his name my best friend called me pathetic.) He was a bouncer/ fill-in bartender downtown Chicago. The first time I met him, I was having a difficult time standing after too many Patron shots, followed by one too many vodka tonics, and yet another round of beers during a night out with girl friends.

With the unfamiliar voice on the other end, my stomach started flipping over and rolling around; I was nervous. It was almost a week later, and I had kind of forgotten I had given him my number. Well, he was nice enough to remind me who he was, even though I knew who he was, because as I recall, he told me I was “pretty wasted, and probably wasn’t going to remember having even talked to him.” Ha, I wasn’t that wasted; I remembered. Most of it anyway.

“Number 10: Wait three days before calling back The idea behind this dating rule of thumb is to make sure that your new squeeze doesn’t think you’re desperate to see her. And it’s become a golden rule because it often works. Many women know the dating game, and want to see if their new man can play it. Prove that you can by keeping it cool, and resisting the urge to follow up on a meeting too promptly. Just make sure not to wait longer than a few days to call back, or she may cool off entirely.”

I remember standing at the front door of the bar, digging in my little black clutch for my driver’s license, while trying to maneuver a cigarette with only my lips, I spotted him; not too tall, not too stocky, dirty blonde hair: he was just my type. My first words to him were, “can you smoke in there?” Real classy, I know. And to my surprise and delight, smoking had yet to be banned in Illinois. Score! He proceeded to laugh at me and inquire about where I could possibly have come from where smoking was not allowed. Well, I’m not from Mars, just Minnesota, but pretty much every other state had banned smoking in the six months prior to my trip downtown. So one can imagine, I was looking forward to enjoying more drinks with a cigarette in hand.

In an effort to slow myself down, I fetched a glass of water and had a slurred conversation with bartender number 1. Somehow we exchanged condensed life stories, decided we had enough in common and I did something I have never done before; I gave him my phone number. And I made sure he knew it was a 763 area code, not the 773 area code found in the Chicago suburbs. Clearly, I was desperate for this 24 year-old, bouncer who had yet to graduate from college, and was currently living at home with his parents, to call me.

We chatted on the phone for maybe two minutes total, the whole time, I was shocked this guy even called me. I don’t think I would have called the guy who was oozing alcohol out of every pore of his body while spilling vodka tonic on the bar and chain smoking. But that’s just me. So after making awkward small talk, while apologizing for my drunkenness, he asked me for a date for the following week to go and have coffee and desert. Maybe drinking has more benefits than I thought.

So when is the appropriate time to call after meeting someone? A day later: too eager. Ten days: clearly he has nothing better to do. Maybe six days is pretty good. It all ends up being a big game anyway. When to call, and even whether or not to call at all. In this technology obsessed world, text messaging has almost replaced calling. Since when did it become okay to send a text to invite someone out to dinner, instead of picking up the phone and making that awkward first call? I prefer the awkwardness. It makes me feel like the guy I am about to go out with, is just a nervous as I am. The awkwardness becomes the comforting norm. Who cares if he called two days later or a week later, I guess I will just be happy he called at all.