Winter in a small town as a single lesbian can get boring, so in a ludicrous attempt to fulfil my lack of current romance, I decided to embrace a silly mission: finding out the shoe size of an attractive acquaintance.
I guess that my little adventure was unconsciously driven by my need to find evidence in the real world that confirmed my inner fear that “fairy tales are lies” and that “romance is dead”. I knew that sharing the shame shoe size with an available attractive fellow lesbian was statistically unlikely. Applying magical childish rules to the real world is crazy, but as Marilyn Monroe once said: “It's better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring”. So I proudly embraced my wacky side.
My attempt number 1 of my undercover princess operation to acquire information on feet size from a pretty girl failed miserably (read my previous post: The Cinderella Test), so I knew that I needed some previous planning before my next attempt, but...
How can I make a plan to find out if my crush shares my shoe size and so, if she is my perfect magic princess match in casual conversation?
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| Street Art found in Brighton. Picture taken on December 2016. |
I started to brainstorm conversation topics in my mind that could involve shoes and, after some thinking, I decided that I needed to come up with a list of “sports and/or activities that might require special shoes” such as:
Roller derby or skating, ice-skating, sky or snowboarding, bowling, bouldering, ballet, tap dancing, flamenco, traditional northern folk dancing that might require uncomfortable shoes, wine pressing…
Ok, those last ones were a bit of a stretch, but who knows what she might be up to… after all, she is just an acquaintance and I have no idea what her hobbies or interests might be.
Now that I had my list of possible conversation topics that involve the use of special shoes, I just needed the perfect situation.
One Wednesday evening when I was commuting from work, I spotted her on the train. However, after our last uncomfortable encounter, I needed to make sure that our next meeting looked natural and unplanned so she wouldn’t think that I was a crazy-stalker (which, in a way, I probably was). So, I decided not to run immediately towards her and ambushed her on the spot with my list of conversational topics that might involve “the use of special shoes”. I patiently stayed in my seat without lifting my eyes from my phone. However, in my head, I started to re-run again the list of activities and planned some possible directions for an informal chat that could lead to the discussion of those leisure activities.
My master plan was to force a “natural meeting” at the station and have a short chat there. With some luck, we could even perhaps end up walking together on the way out.
“We are now approaching Brighton, our final destination” They announced over the loudspeakers.
My heart started pounding as the time to talk to her was getting close… That wasn’t a good sign. I knew that I needed to learn how to manage my emotions better so I would not end up messing it up again. There is a reason why I’m single: because I don’t know how to talk to attractive girls. But I need to keep trying, so “YOU BETTER BEHAVE!” I said internally to my pretty-girls-conversational-anxiety.
I left the train as soon as the doors opened so, I could get ahead of her first only to delay my pace once I would reach the turnstiles. Perhaps pretending that I can't find my ticket, which was in my right pocket as usual, could do the trick. And so my plan worked:
“Hey, are you all right?” She informally said to me when she saw me.
“Hey… how are you?” I replied hiding my excitement and pretending that I had not seen her before on the train.
“Good, I had a long day at work, but it seems to be over now” She said smiling.
Why is she so pretty and nice? And… why are no words coming out of my mouth???
After a couple of seconds pretending that I was looking for my ticket and that I finally found it by surprise I answered:
“Yeah, work is over, but I still need to go…”
In a micro-second I started to run in my mind all of the possible endings of that sentence so I could perhaps introduce the topic of sports that might need special shoes:
... skating? I don’t have skates!
... ice-skating? There isn’t any ice-ring nearby!
... skiing? There are no hills or snow in Brighton… keep thinking…
... bowling? I have only done it twice in my life and I suck at it…
... bouldering, I’ve never tried it before…
... ballet, flamenco tap dancing, folk dancing?… It doesn’t really fit my personality… and I have two left feet…
... wine pressing… really?
“… I’m going to yoga” I finally said.
To be fair that was actually the truth. I can’t lie very well and, under pressure, I get as honest and straightforward as if an Easter-European gangster with a Russian accent points a gun to my forehead.
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| Street Art found in Brighton. Picture taken on December 2016. |
“Cool, I do yoga too” She answered as she was advancing fast on her way out of the station.
Quick say something to keep on chatting… I haven’t even used any of my planned conversational prompts yet and she is leaving!
“You do? I really like yoga because… I love being bare feet” I said while I was discretely chasing her through the crowd that was also leaving the station at the same time in a human current.
WHAT??? That’s the silliest reason to like yoga that I’ve ever heard!
“I love that about yoga too!” She said turning her head around.
“Listen, I need to run, it was nice to see you” She added and touched my arm before rushing her way out of the station.
“It was nice to see you too…” I shouted from the distance a bit disappointed.
So, my second attempt to find out the shoe size of an attractive stranger failed again…
Should I keep on trying or should I give up?
To be continued...
