Never Dated a Writer? Good, Here’s Why

I’ve never dated another writer. I’d like to, but it’s the sort of unattainable relationship that you pine after all the while maintaining awareness that it’s an unrealistic endeavor. It’s doomed to fail. Writers date musicians, they date sculptors, painters even. But you cannot have two duelling pens in a relationship- it’s sort of an unwritten universal law.
Two writers will always get along famously in the beginning -they might even toy with the ever-elusive “soul mate” idea- then one (or sometimes both) parties will back away like a cat on crack. But sometimes you think you’re invincible, and sometimes you just want to give it the old college try. So, against my better judgement, I let myself entertain the idea of dating another writer.

I’d developed a writer’s crush- he’s smart, articulate, and a bit like me in that he’s got quirky worldview that some might find endearing and others might find pretentious. He’s got weird interests -when I say weird I mean that it’s rare to find someone who shares my peculiar fixations- and he’s hilarious. I should’ve written this article two weeks ago when everything was hunky-dory. I should’ve also left it as a purely online thing. Shoulda, woulda, coulda. Instead, I’m writing it now and it’s a “house always wins” type of deal. The house being the universe in this case, and the gambler being me.

Let’s start at the beginning- I approach him for a writing collab via email. He agrees and we begin to make beautiful music together. Our words flow; we’ve got an email exchange going that actually makes me want to check my overflowing inbox. Every morning I wake up and I root through the onslaught of PR emails to find his latest addition to the piece… and it’s always good and certainly better than the stuff I’m spewing. Things quickly escalate: we graduate to an instant messaging mobile platform. We finish the piece (neither of us is sure it’s any good), and we continue to IM. Chatting turns into Skyping (yes, it’s a verb, and sans camera for those of you who are wondering), and we have two consecutive calls that exceed two hours each. Yes, we get along that well. I find him funnier and smarter by turns, and he finds me… weirder? Stranger? I’m not sure, because all of a sudden he disappears. Not vanishes per se, but becomes aloof and sort of cat-and-mousey.

I don’t have a lot of patience for that sort of thing, and seeing as how he’s a writer, I chalk it up to the idiosyncrasies that all writers have hidden. Sooner or later, the oddities and eccentricities rear their heads like an unattractive form of flora that only blooms at night. You must know that we (read: writers) all have got major issues otherwise we’d never be able to write a good piece. It’s another unwritten universal law. Despite my misgivings, I give it a week or so to see if he’ll return to his former splendor. My initial suspicions are confirmed: he’s got issues and he’s begun to project them onto our convos. I suggest he’s ambivalent (I am somewhat ambivalent and I know a mirror when I see one), and he bristles, “Well this is the extent to which my friendship extends. If it’s disappointing there is nothing I can do about it.” I laugh, but I’m vexed by his reaction. Why? Mostly because I saw (yes, past tense) myself flouting this writer-on-writer rule, and maybe even meeting him IRL. As an aside, IRL stands for “In Real Life” and AFK stands for “Away From Keyboard”- this is one of gems I glean from him during one of those great conversations we had. Now, to a writer this is a whole different thing, since meeting AFK also suggests we’re going beyond the professional writing collab and pursuing something else. Like a more-than-friends type of something else. I ask him frankly, with a steely jaw, not to introduce baggage into our interactions and offer him a white flag: “Don’t kill it please”. He responds with what I interpret as a sardonic smiley, and a little bit of finger pointing: “You don’t kill it”.  We’ve both managed to kill it, if it wasn’t dead and buried already.