Worst Date Ever

It’s said that there’s no fool like an old fool and, of course, like many sayings that have stood the test of time, it’s quite true. It’s probably more humiliating than otherwise because the old fool should have enough experience to know better. Yet, even when wisdom has been ignored, age offers consolation, for however red-faced the fool is now, experience has taught him that this too, shall pass.

No, for real down-and-dirty, pull-out-the-stops, couldn’t-you-just-die humiliation, I look back to my teenage years. Like every other teenager, my adolescent body contained a raging stew of hormones that pulled my mind along strange, new paths even as it reshaped my body. Like all children, I still thought the world revolved around me but, unlike when I was younger, everything was as much threat as opportunity and a single wrong move on my part or it’s could ruin me for life. I can’t tell you how many nights something as minor as getting a zit or a snub from the “in” crowd, would have me frantically raging against the cruelty of the heavens or, alternately, pleading with them to stop the torture and please, please, let Scotty beam me up!


Even with such a wealth of embarrassments, one incident in particular stands out in my memory. It had to do with my first car and my first serious girlfriend.

Ever since I had gotten my driver’s license at age sixteen, I had been working hard at various odd and part-time jobs to get enough money to buy my own car. A car would give me the freedom to go places when I wanted to, not just when my parents were willing to let me borrow theirs. Owning a car would be taking one more step in the rite of passage to adulthood and, all of a sudden, the need became urgent.