A Lesson for the Ages (or Best. Night. EVER.)

Okay, I know I haven’t written about my Amsterdam trip. Every time I start on it I get distracting and disinterested. Maybe it’s because, fun as it was, not that much actually happened. Or it might be because I summed up my trip via Skype with three of my most devoted readers already (you know who you are) thus sapping my initiative to sit down and write about it. I will write about it. But right now I just want to tell y’all about my amazing night last night.

I came back to Dublin with renewed energy to get out there, experience things and meet new people. I had a fun time at The George’s bingo night on Sunday; it was as if the performing drag queens chose their numbers just for me (ie. ‘The Elephant Love Medley’ from ‘Moulin Rouge’ and Liza Minnelli’s ‘New York, New York’, which I most definitely sang every line to). As soon as they let us, I danced my butt off, but I didn’t really meet anybody and got intimidated by all the beautiful mans there.

During dinner on Monday evening I cuddled up with reruns of ‘Scrubs’ and ‘How I Met Your Mother’ (which is all about going out and meeting people, and whose photo-montage title credits give me pre-nostalgia for my twenties) and I was like, “I need to get out there!” I walked all the way to the North side, to Panti Bar. It was craft night and so a drag queen was handing out plasticine with instructions to illustrate events from your summer, which to me sounded way too hard. I just wanted to build a pyramid! I sat for about half an hour, nursing a beer, and looking around the room. I knew that if I stayed long enough an old creeper would probably strike up a conversation, but for some reason I wanted to do better that night. Eventually I spied a group, a girl and three boys, who were young and talkative and friendly-looking. I watched them for awhile, trying to figure out my opening line and working up the nerve to approach them. My heart was pounding in my chest and I kept talking myself out of it. Finally, I grabbed my mound of red plasticine and went over to their table.

“Hi, I really want to build stuff with plasticine, but I’m worried it’d look weird if I did by myself. Do you mind if I join you?” The girl gave me a welcoming smile. “Of course not! Pull up a chair!” “I’m not a creeper, I swear...” I added, unnecessarily.
“My name is DeDe. I’m from California. This is my friend Dylan. He’s from New York. We’re here for a wedding.” Dylan briefly acknowledged my presence. “And these our two new Irish friends! We just met them at the last bar we were at.”
“Wow, I thought you guys were all friends.”
“Well, we are now! And so are you.”

As we chatted, Dylan went to get drinks and the Irish guys left because they had work to do the next day. When Dylan came back he was very not impressed that they had left without saying good bye and he obsessed about how hot they were. Then he went off to meet other guys. It became manifestly clear right away that I did not warrant that kind of attention.
“Canadian, huh?” One of the only things he said to me. “I’ve met some hot Canadians...”
“Have you, now?” I said, the indirect burn slowly sinking in. I turned to DeDe and said more quietly, “You know, I’ve met some beautiful women...” and she laughed.

As Dylan went trolling for men, DeDe and I had plenty of time to bond, and I quickly became her new favourite person. We made each other characters from ‘Yellow Submarine’ out of plasticine and she explained that sometimes she got in trouble by flirting too much with gay men. Dylan eventually returned with a very cute Irish lad named Kevin; sandy blond hair, blue eyes, innocent face. DeDe couldn’t stop telling him how handsome he was and touching his arm. He said he was out with two girlfriends and they were going to go to the Dragon next and we should join them. When he left, Dylan whined at DeDe for flirting so shamelessly. When we were again left alone I told her, “He should let you flirt away. He’s a gay man! Anyway, YOU are not his competition...”

As the two Americans and I made our way towards the Dragon I tried to give them at the very least a rudimentary tour of Dublin. “So we’re crossing the Liffey now...”
“The what?”
“The Liffey. It’s the main river that runs through Dublin.”
“Oh, like in Paris.”
“Yes... like in Paris.”

When we got to the Dragon we joined Kevin and his two girlfriends at a booth. It was a Monday night, so no one was really there at the beginning, but then a surprising amount of people began showing up. Not totally happy with the selection at our table, Dylan preceded to gather more men from the bar. Before we knew it, a cute Indian guy was at our table, who called over his shy Philippino friend. Dylan seemed to be really good at approaching people and introducing himself, but not so good at continuing it from there. DeDe and I started the dancing, but she became disappointed that the DJ didn’t play many 80’s songs.

Back at our table, she complained about how she wasn’t going to make out with anybody that night.
“Do you want to kiss later?” she asked, at least partially in jest (I believe).
“I don’t really make out with girls. Sorry, but they all feel like my sisters.”
I went back on the dance floor and rocked out to most of the hit songs of the summer. My favourite moment had to be when we danced to Beyonce ‘Single Ladies’ and all wagged our hands in the air and I leaned into Kevin (despite, or rather, because of the fact that Dylan was trying to dance with him in a way to cut him off from his girlfriends and me) and asked, “How many Beyonces does it take to screw in a light bulb? None! I’m Beyonce, I don’t screw in lightbulbs, bitch!” And he laughed.

When I went back to the table, DeDe was stuck in an awkward conversation with another Indian gay guy and I didn’t really know how to extract her, so I wandered around instead. I found Kevin and his two friends (but thankfully not Dylan) upstairs by the smoking patio sitting in big comfy chairs and I joined them. We all talked and bonded, and one of the girls lives close to my neighbourhood.

“Any cute boys tonight?” Kevin asked.
“Other than you? Not many...” I answered, and he smiled. Then the conversation continued, but my finding him attractive came up again and next thing I knew he leaned in, across the table, for a kiss. He so surprised me that I barely kissed back.
“Oh, sorry! Didn’t know you were going to do that!” I stammered, all flustered, not believing that the one guy I had thought was cute the whole evening wanted to kiss me.
“That’s okay. (Pause) Want to come out for a smoke with me?”
“Yes.”
As we got up and walked outside he asked, “Do you even smoke?”
“No,” I laughed.

He borrowed a lighted from these two hunky guys, lit his cigarette and then leaned in immediately for another kiss. He caught me off guard again and I swung my arm in a weird way, knocking his cigarette out of his hand.
“Oh my god, sorry!” I cried.
“No, I’m sorry! Did I burn you?”
“No,” I said, looking down at my arm. ‘I’ve just decided to become Ally McFuckingBeal tonight,’ I thought. I turned bright red and started to giggle. It was at that moment that I figured out how much I must’ve liked him. He faced the hot men again, lit another cigarette and then we successfully kissed. But I was distracted with my breath.
“Do I taste alright?”
“Yes.” And he’d kiss me again.
We went back in and rejoined the girls, and we all continued talking like nothing had happened. I made some joke about Dylan ignoring me and Kevin was like, “But do you fancy him?”
“No.”
“Then it doesn’t matter. I mean, he’s nice enough, but comes on kinda strong.”
After a little while, he invited me out for another cigarette break and we kissed some more.
“You taste very nice.”
“You’re just saying that because I asked before!” I cried.
“No, I’m not.” I got all flustered again.

I began worrying that something would upset things, that some unknown event would ruin my life, that even though I had already got his mobile number, I would never see Kevin again. These are the kinds of things that dance through your head when you all of the sudden like someone. But we both started to lose each other in the kissing.
“Okay, we should stop,” he said. “I don’t want to ditch my friends.” He’s a good friend too.
So we went back inside and pretty soon they decided they needed to drive home. I walked them downstairs and found no one at our first table, but my shirt and jacket un-stolen (bless Dublin!) As everyone gathered their stuff, Dylan reappeared.
“You’re not leaving?”

“Yeah, we need to drive home to the country.” Then everyone stood around awkwardly for a minute, so I began giving little hugs and kisses to the girls.
“It was nice meeting you,” Kevin said to Dylan. “So,” he turned to me. “You walking us out?”
And that was my John Hughes teen movie, the nerdy one ends up with the dreamboat, PERFECT moment.
“Sure,” I said, and followed them outside. Out on George Street, suddenly back in the real world, there was no kiss goodbye, but as we discovered that we’d be walking in opposite directions, Kevin said, “Well, you have my mobile number.”
“Yes! I do!”
“Talk to you soon,” and they wandered away.
To say I was giddy would be an understatement. But I couldn’t leave without saying goodbye to DeDe and I considered going back into the bar to look for her. And then I saw her leaving against the building with a handsome STRAIGHT Irish lad with dark hair and blue eyes.
“Dede! I wasn’t going to leave without saying goodbye!”
“Hey! Thanks for leaving me that whole time!” To which I felt like answering that I was not the one she was travelling with but abandoned to attempt to pick up twenty men, but I let it slide. I told her the whole story with Kevin, including the embarrassing Ally McBeal bits.
“You’re getting all flustered!” she cried. “You like him!”
“Shuddup!”
“Call him tomorrow!”
“It’s going to end in heartbreak,” I said, cynically.
“You don’t know that...”she countered.
“Okay, well, I should walk home, because nothing else can happen to make this night better. But I want to thank you for being so welcoming to me at first.”
“But you had the balls to come over to a table of strangers!” she said. “Good for you.”
“Okay, well, thanks for everything. You two have fun!”
“You’re a beautiful person!” DeDe yelled after me as I walked away and I turned and blew her a kiss.

I walked home in a complete daze.