Pole Dating

This is not a confessional about how I can’t meet the right man (paging Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy!), but a query about food and culture.  Let me say though that immigrant dating is a fraught venture.  I am too American for Poles and too Polish for Americans.  No wait!  Poles are too Polish for me and Americans are not Polish enough.  No wait!  Poles are not American enough and Americans are too American.  No wait!  I am too American for Poles, and too Polish for Americans.  It’s a predicament.  Add to that equation my “wet blanket/I can’t live without you—I don’t need you/get a life” personality and you’ve got yourself what my fellow Poles ever-so-endearingly refer to as an old maid. [*Bicultural digression: I was not aware of any words to describe unattached women in Polish except for panna (maiden—ugh!) or stara panna (old maid) until the arrival of democracy and capitalism when Poles began to adapt the English word “single” as a noun.  If you’re a single woman, the hip crowd refers to you as a singielka.  My rather large extended family is not hip.*]

A few months ago, I went on a rather strange date.  Not strange enough for abadcaseofthedates.com, but strange enough for me.  We made plans to meet for dinner.  Date said something rather strange over the phone as we agreed to meet at a local Chinese restaurant, but I dismissed it.  He said something about “hitting up” an Asian grocery store before dinner.  I dismissed it because who goes to the grocery store on a date and, more importantly, who goes to the grocery store when they don’t need to?  But I get so nervous during these initial date exchanges that I quickly chalked up his suggestion to my own Polish-inflected hearing.  

Immigrant or not, I’m no idiot and was not about to have a guy I’ve never met pick me up at home.  We agreed to meet at the restaurant of my choosing.  I arrived a couple of minutes before my date and the place was dead.  There were two people there and one of them was working.  When my date arrived, I proposed that we drive down to another restaurant, just minutes away.  He told me to follow him.  I did.  I knew the other restaurant and was surprised when he made a left turn blocks before we arrived at our destination.  God help me, I followed (it's not like it was a dark alley, so I kept going).  I quickly saw, however, that it was, CRAP, a local Asian supermarket.  We got out of our cars and he suggested that we check the place out.  Let me emphasize, I am waaaaaay too nice to people I’ve just met.  My friends will tell you that I am waaaaay nicer to strangers than I am to them.  This is true.  I am working on it, but may need professional help for it.  But I digress.  We walked into the store.  I had been to that store before and had no idea why he wanted to “check it out.”  Check it out he did.  I followed him up one aisle and then decided that I was A/ embarrassed and B/ needed some groceries.  We separated for a few minutes and met up in the market’s impressive seafood department.  “Mmmm,” he said, “it smells horrible.”  What the hell?  “That’s what fish smells like,” I responded.  By now, I was both hungry and embarrassed, so I said “I’m starving, can we get dinner now?”  Why I didn’t just leave him there, I don’t know. “This doesn’t gross you out?” he asked.  I’m not a vegetarian and having grown up in a small town/farming community, I harbor no illusions about the source of my dinner.  “Nope,” I said, “can we go now?”  I had a few items and needed to pay.  I did and, to my relief, we left and drove to the restaurant.  Again, why I didn’t just leave, I really don’t know.  Perhaps, despite my Polish upbringing, I am an optimist?

At dinner, my date disappointed further.  For one, he was one of those thigh-slapping jokesters who make inappropriate comments to the servers (if you have ever worked as a waiter/waitress as I have, you know who I’m talking about).  For another, though he professed to be a liberal, he told me that he was “conservative on some issues.”  When I asked which ones, he told me “like immigration.”  Ouch!  To make a long story short, in order to avoid a full on conflagration (which I can handle with friends, but not strangers), I called him Archie Bunker and he ended up calling me “Ms. Ellen DeGeneres Stalin.”  Except for the genocidal maniac part of it, I felt vindicated.  

All of this to say: how is it that we live in one of the most culturally diverse countries in the world and yet feel that a trip to the local supermarket is an adventure into the realm of the unknown?  To be fair, my date may have been an exception to the rule.  He did tell me that he doesn’t read the newspaper or listen to the news.  No need.  All he needs to do is walk down the street to know what’s going on in the world.  CRAP!