A Date With the Cops

The depths of online dating. Like every other lesson in life, you learn it the hard way.

Back when I was in Indiana, I had gone steady with a guy for a little over two years. When I took an internship in Cleveland, Georgia, aka the middle of nowhere, I worked at a zoo called The North Georgia Zoo and Paradise Farms. It's not quite on the popularity map and any time I mentioned I worked at a Zoo, everyone got excited because they thought I was talking about Atlanta. Long story short, the place had around 1,000 living things there, if you counted the possums and deer. Besides the little zoo, hundreds of mining shops, and Walmart, there wasn't much to offer. The mountain view was amazing though, and it almost felt worthwhile driving through fog every night during my evening trips.

In my first month of working there, I had received a text from my steady partner that we were no longer going to be together. Calling him, I found out that he had found his perfect match at his current workplace, and a year later, his first child was born. While I wonder how that "perfect" match worked up, today I couldn't be more happy how it played out for me. But at the time, I was heartbroken and devastated. I was ten hours away from my friends, family, or anyone I knew—except a single aunt living near Atlanta, Georgia. Naturally, I cried, grew depressed, and lost ten pounds after two weeks. I was on the edge of calling my internship quits and heading back home after a couple months in. To release my pent up loneliness of being in a small town, I turned to online dating.

I found out the hard way that online dating can be full of surprises. People lie, host fake profiles, and shame the 50 percent of people who are actually using the website to potentially find someone special. As in my case, I was in the boonies, and most of my hobbies included but not limited to: gaming, writing and crafting. Since I didn't go out much, I had a minimal chance of meeting someone single on a whim, and even more of a small chance that anyone would even dare ask me on a date. Since I was into the shy, nerdy type; I figured going online would be the best for me.

So I went online. I signed up for OkCupid, Plenty of Fish, Tinder, and even a little phone app called MeetMe. I found a few guys and did a few things I could honestly say I regret. Not for my health, but because I used them as a rebound. Scared, I left many behind without contact because I knew I didn't want to get caught up in their home life. I found out that you had to be smart if you were going to online date. I've met up with men who were twice their age that they stated on their profile, men who only wanted sex and those who, like me at the time, just needed a rebound—someone to use.

One of my last online daters I met was a young guy that I connected well with on an emotional level. It was someone who knew depression just as well as I did. So we connected. We went out on a first date and spent time at a mall an hour south of where I lived. It was fun, refreshing, and new to talk to someone so deep about subjects I never did before. He was going to therapy, something I should have done if I had the option back then. The first date was a hit and while both of us really just treated the occasion like a friendship, it was nice not feeling lonely. He confided in me, and I to him about emotional pasts we could not let go of.

A second date came about and we decided to head out to a park a half hour from where I stayed. I had developed small amounts of feelings toward him from our late night messages and while together I tried to scoot toward him while walking or sitting down for a break. He would scoot away and I would try again with subtle hints. I eventually went verbal and asked if he wanted to sit closer and he looked absolutely mortified. I figured it had to do with him having no experience dating or perhaps he really didn't realize we were on a date. He would tell me, "I'm fine" or "It's OK," sometimes even standing up to distance himself even further. I let it slide since I was patient and allowed him some time, if he didn't want to be near me for a date, then he would have never brought up the idea, I had thought. Finally after spending hours outside at the park and with me giving hints up and down, he told me that he was still hung up on another girl. He wanted advice. The girl was in another country, so I had little to offer him and we decided to sit in my car for the rest of the evening listening to a soundtrack CD I had.

Night time rolled around and we hung around each other, lonely, awkwardly, and I wondered if he was even going to get out of my car. Finally, when it was quiet long enough, I asked what he thought about us. He stared at me in surprise and stated, "I wasn't interested, I hope you didn't get the wrong impression." Assuming we found each other on OkCupid, a well-known dating website, you can relate to my confusion. Not once did he communicate that there was no interest, but I continued forward, feeling my heart ache a little that he just wanted to be friends. I had a gut feeling it had been a subtle hint toward a friends with benefits situation eventually, such as a previous guy I had found on the MeetMe app. But I didn't want to get caught up in another situation such as that.

I remember staying quiet for about ten minutes, and just when I was about to turn the car back on and ask him to get out and leave, a bright light shined in my driver's side window. Two cops peered inside my car and I remember feeling fear suddenly racing in my mind. I could see my "date" next to me freeze in panic, as well. The two men asked us to get out of the car and we both did, crying out in panic that we "swore we were not up to no good." It was the truth. We had done nothing. But the cops had shook their heads. Other, more dirty ideas ran through their minds I had only assumed. They asked for our IDs, why we were there, and where we were from. I was mortified, standing there in the dark with a strange boy and two cops peering at us like some lost lovers from the Titanic. I was over ten hours away from home, no one knew where I was, and I had no cash on me. I was terrified. After giving our IDs back, they ordered us to leave and I obeyed, driving my half hour back home and trying not to wake my three other roommates since it was well past midnight. Closing the door, I remember looking at my messages and seeing he had sent me many panicked texts; he had feared he was going to jail or getting billed with a ticket, etc. I told him to relax and later found out he spilled the whole story to his parents the following day. At age 25, I figured it would have been normal to confide in friends or keep the embarrassing act to yourself. But now the story has been passed around his family, I'm only glad I never met them.

In the end, we still stayed friends; I moved further away, so we only keep in contact online to check up on one another. While the cops were a surprise, it serves another lesson to always be careful with online dating. I was one of the lucky ones—no one knew where I was. I traveled every evening to get away from my depression, the road curing my enveloping sadness. The chats and dates with strangers made me forget for a small time. But I was lucky. I never was raped, caught out, or put in an unfortunate situation that was broadcasted on the evening news station. But it could have happened. Easily.

My worst date consisted of a guy that chose to play along as strictly friends and ending up in plenty of awkward conversations. During the end of the date, the moment was shattered by the cops "busting" us while sitting at a local park. Taking our IDs and our pride with them, we drove our separate ways back home. We learned that, while stalled at a local park late at night as a young couple, you could be pegged as a public sex offender if kids happened to be walking nearby. #Themoreyouknow

Kenzii Shy

#MyWorstDate