Modern Dating: Article #14
Pre-Pandemic Life
Recently I asked an ex on and off again fling if he remembered the night we met. It was purely for writing purposes; I was curious and needed an article. He’s been an interesting character in my life, we’ve always seemed to keep in contact for whatever reason. Tom and I met about 9 years ago in my hometown when I had just moved into a 1-bedroom apartment downtown with my closest friend, Dimi. He was a couple years older, from Ireland, recently moved, chose my random hometown because of the closeness to Toronto. It was a chance encounter the way we met, I never exactly told him why I was standing on the sidewalk by myself that night.
I was up to no good, 21 in my hood, drinking, partying, making all the wrong decisions but having a great time doing it. Recently I had just dropped out of Fanshawe College for drinking too much, yeah… that’s where I was at in life. I was working minimum wage and not exactly hanging out with a great crowd. That night I had been drinking and just came back from the bar we lived around the corner of. I was texting a guy I wasn’t very keen on, but l was drunk and bored. He was coming to meet me to hangout for a bit, so I went downstairs outside our building to wait for him, it was a warm summer night, the taxicab company across the street had a line of people waiting. I was on my phone, not paying much attention when I saw two guys walking up to me, one was wearing a bright orange shirt. I can’t remember the other guy at all, I just remember Tom was wearing this awful shirt. I honestly don’t know why we engaged with each other, we were both too drunk to remember but were both out going people so my guess he walked right up and made a joke than hit on me. hat day I had undergone a transformation, I died my brown hair blonde, so I guess I wasn’t super recognizable. While I was talking to Tom that night the guy, I planned on meeting walked right by me without even realizing it was me. I just watched him walk behind Tom’s head and tried not to laugh. Honestly it was great, I realized I would much rather keep talking to Tom than make a drunken mistake. Tom was charming, maybe it was the accent, I ended up giving him my phone number and we dated for the next couple months. He just walked into my life that night and never left.
The long distance has always been a reason we never pursued it, but from time to time we meet up still. The last time was last year before the pandemic started. I was broken up with FML at the time. Tom was living in a gorgeous condo downtown; I went to go visit him. We had a drink on his balcony overlooking Toronto, you could see the CN Tower off in the distance and we just talked for hours, it was so easy. Of course, I was physically attracted to him, the guy is hot and from Ireland. Tom is such a lively person I enjoyed being around him. So, after hours of talking, he asked if I wanted to stay the night, I did.
Moral of the story: don’t insta judge them because of a bright orange shirt, you just never know.
(The answer he gave me was, “Vaguely lol”)
Stay Safe,
Justine Fraser
@justinefrasers
JustineFraser.com 