Part Fourteen: Mixing it up

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"All I ever meet is douchebags," my friend whines to me. Repeatedly. "Douchebags" and gay guys.

There are many reasons for this, I patiently try to explain to her--I mean many reasons aside from the fact that New York is crawling with douchebags and gay guys.

The gay guys can be partially explained by her insistence on wearing really pointy shoes. I've had this argument with others before. And you can deny it all you want. But as much as you, dear women, might like your pointy shoes, the only other people who will really notice them and like them are other women and gay guys. Straight guys will not so much notice them-notice them. Rather, some vague, subconscious warning light will go off in their heads, alerting them to the presence of a pair of Castrato 2000s in the near vicinity.

That and pointy shoes remind us of witches.

The douchebags? Well, douchebag is a relative term. This particular friend, deep down inside, is a sorority girl (was, in fact, IN a sorority) who is trying to live the hipster life. She claims to despise "suits" but is destined to mate with one and produced baby suits. Still, she hangs out in Lower East Side and Williamsburg bars, trolling for too-skinny, geeky musicians who never fail to disappoint because, well, they're musicians, hipster-wannabes and she, deep down inside, is only now realizing she's not exactly compatible with those people. That's not to say she has to end up with a frat boy. I wouldn't wish that on anyone. She needs someone sort of in the middle. But, for now, like a lot of us out there, she's frustrated by running into the same type of guy over and over and over again.

And I found myself in the odd position of running out of advice. Then I met VittlesVamp the other night and she explained to me this experiment that she and a girlfriend have going on. She and a girlfriend, embarking on a girl's night out, decided to forsake the regular old stomping grounds and try some place new. And the trick isn't just to try some place new. It takes more than walking out of Welcome to the Johnsons, crossing the street and going into the Magician. No, the trick here is to try an entirely different neighborhood, a different genre, if you will. That isn't to say you have to go completely out of character and hang out in some rooftop bar in Times Square looking for lonely business men or divorced women on vacation, but perhaps you should at least THINK about going out above 14th Street or, if you're an Upper East or West Sider, switch sides or go downtown. Me? I go where I'm invited and, while I PREFER downtown or Brooklyn (partly because of the crowds, mostly because it's easier), I've never turned down invites to UES, UWS and, yes, even Williamsburg bars. (Oddly enough I find the annoying frat types of the Upper East Side MUCH less snobby about going out downtown than vice versa. They shriek a great deal less than supposedly cool people when they're asked to go anywhere above 23rd Street.)

VittlesVamp and her pal decided to try out spots in Midtown. And while the post doesn't necessarily make this clear, there was one other guideline. One of them HAD to start up a conversation with someone of the opposite sex while there. The results? Well, she's got two posts so far, here and here.

Will this solve all your dating problems? Of course not. It might not solve any. And if you're a tiny white girl and walk into the wrong Harlem bar, it might cause more problems. Or if you're a skinny black dude and walk into the wrong mafia run bar, that might cause problems, too. But, as in all things, use some common sense.

Of course, in a small town, your choices will always be limited. But one of the things that always amazes me about New York--and I'm completely guilty of this as well--is the ruts we dig for ourselves. Given a choice of a million bars, we'll go to the same four or five. Which is fine and good, but if your stated goal is to catch a man or a woman and you've been running into the same problems, you need to find a new rut--if you know what I'm saying.

And it's not just with bars. The same rule applies to races, creed and types. Don't simply write off a guy because he's wearing a suit or, conversely, he's wearing a trucker cap (although you should train him to ditch the hat and grow the fuck up already as soon as possible). Hell, I'd never write off a girl because she's a Democrat. Honestly, despite the (R) behind my name, hardcore Republican chicks bore and/or frighten me. I like to change it up. I'm not saying I'd date a filthy hippie, mind you, but I'd totally sleep with one (if she showered before hand). So, get out there and switch it up a little. Race. Creed. Type. And, yes, even religion.

As an atheist, the religion thing ticks me off sometimes. Now, I'm no longer an idealistic 17-year-old who'll make brash statements about love conquering all--even the racial and religious prejudices of your entire family. Relationships are often hard enough without adding social and cultural pressures. But out of curiosity, and I know I'll probably catch hell for this, why is it WRONG to say the following:

I'd never bring a black girl home to meet my folks.
A Muslim? Fuck no, I'd never date a Muslim.
My dad would kill me if I brought home a Puerto Rican guy.
My family would never let me bring home a Jew.

But it's perfectly acceptable when a seemingly rational, cool, enlightened person says this:

I don't date non-Jews.

All the other groups at least have the decency to hold out a LITTLE hope for a brother. Most Catholic, Irish, Italian, Episcopalian, African-American, Jamaican girls (and guys) have been trained to say, in public at any rate, they'd consider ALL options. They might be lying through their teeth, but at least they say the right thing in public. But Jewish girls (and guys)? They can stand there in public and write off the bulk of the population.

I think I might be a little jealous that they can get away with saying something like that--something that, on the face of it, is un-PC--in public.

But honestly, the only reason this pisses me off is because I know a lot of hot Jewish girls. And it breaks a guy's heart when they put out a shingle that says "Goys need not apply."

But that's okay. This is all about switching up, right? And if they won't switch up, I sure as hell can. Just the other night, I found myself at a party talking to AND, more important attracted to a plain old white girl with blond hair and blue eyes. She even had a plain old one-syllable, white-girl name. Typically, I get tangled up with Hispanic and Jewish girls (but no Hispanic Jewish girls... yet). But, for maybe the second or third time in my life, I found myself getting a little moony about a blonde. Hell, the girl probably lives on the Upper East Side, of all places. She may even have been in a sorority at some point.

Absolutely nothing came of it--one of those times I let the moment slip away--but it did remind me that sometimes, a change of venue can provide a change of perspective.

So, maybe this weekend, I'm gonna go hang out in Bay Ridge. I just KNOW the girl of my dreams--and her really big hair and her 89 IROC--is out there somewhere.

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