31 fractures: 9

1/9: Kevin

Not the same Kevin I referenced for 1/8, this Kevin and I met at a bar for the farewell party of a mutual friend who was leaving for Americorps. He was amazing: tall, dark, handsome, and intelligent enough to question the western imperialist implications of the Peace Corps. We started casually chatting and within a minute or two he told me that he had just returned from his Peace Corps service (I wish I could remember where). I had already had a few drinks talking with Peter about a community farm he was planning on starting, and I suppose that was evident from my lack of reserve. Because as soon as he mentioned the Peace Corps I casually brought up my concerns about it. Totally rude of me, I know, that's like asking a war vet you just met how many people the vet has killed in their lifetime or something. But I was concerned about the PC, and I was concerned that no one in Madison seemed to be concerned about the PC, ya dig? To my surprise, however, instead of producing an immense amount of awkwardness with this incredibly good-looking pseudo-stranger, he replied something along the lines of "I know, I'm trying to work through that." Then we proceeded to talk for the next 2.5 hours (and several beers) about this stuff. That could have been the best spontaneously-averted-foot-in-mouth moment of my life! We agreed to meet sometime without alcohol to talk further. That's when he gave me his girlfriend's home phone number. Because, you know, they were living together so you could get a hold of him just fine. I remember the feeling of the "Dammit!" at that moment, and how I gracefully made a few inquiries about her without showing my disappointment (or, at least the beer convinced me this was so). We left, and I hadn't called him yet. But really, I was being unfair. This guy had total inteligencia network potential: super smart, sj-oriented, everything. And I couldn't really fault him for being all living-with-the-girlfriend. I just needed a few months for the sting to wear off.

So, on Friday I called him. I left him a message that fit in perfectly with the feel of our first meeting: awkward.

It ran something like this:
"Hi Kevin, this is [] you probably don't remember me but we met at Sarah's going-away party. Yeah I'm applying to grad schools about now and I know we talked about getting together sometime to talk about things, so let's do it before I leave town. Haha. You can reach me at []."

Yeah, call me back in the next, idunno, 6-8 months? Kthxbai.

Yeesh.