Great Chemistry in Person
I went on a date with a beautiful, intelligent woman that I met through my matchmaking service a week and a half ago, and we had great chemistry in person. We had awesome, engaging conversations. She seemed to be enjoying herself. We held hands. We exchanged phone numbers after two and a half hours walking around together, laughing, flirting, having a great time. I've been on a number of dates — that's at least 20 first dates this year, and I went on lots of first dates in my 20s — so I know when there's some decent chemistry versus when there's not. We exchanged phone numbers at the end of the date, and she texted me within 30 minutes of the date ending, saying she had a great time.
And one thing: I kind of showed up with my heart a little closed. I was in my head trying to make sure I was being maximum masculine, making sure to follow all this stuff, and to kind of compensate for the woman I called the queen. With her, I really opened my heart and was ready to love, and she pulled away and needed space, and I just got crushed by her response and all of that. So I showed up to this date a bit more closed hearted, and I had a hard time opening my heart. I took two hours to respond to this woman's text message after she sent it. I was just having a hard time even figuring out what to say.
Then I texted her the next day and we got a phone call set up. She said — again, just like the queen — that she had an out of town trip to see her family. And I already started catastrophizing. I'm like, there's no point in putting any effort into this. She's going to go on this trip with her family, she's going to flake out, she's going to implode. It's not going to happen. She's going to send me a message saying she didn't feel the connection. Guarantee you that's what's going to happen. At the same time, she told me she really appreciates when a man puts in effort, that she's completely not interested in any of that avoidant game stuff. But the queen said the same kind of thing, and I believed it. So with her, I'm like, I don't know if this is even true or not. But again, this is a beautiful woman with a beautiful heart and a beautiful, intelligent mind — single most of her adult life, pretty hesitant to open up, and yet seeming to really be interested in finding love too.
The Day-by-Day Texting Timeline
So here's how it went. We went out Saturday. We texted and set up a phone conversation for Sunday. Monday, I don't text her, because I'm like, do I need to text these women every single day? Tuesday, I send a short text. She sends a short text back. Wednesday, we have an hour-long phone call, which I thought went really well.
Maybe I shouldn't have told her the story I told her. She asked me for a travel story, and she talked about some travel story overseas somewhere. I've lived overseas. I have travel stories. But the story I told her was this: in 2010, I was 25 years old and living with my parents. I walked out of my parents' house without my phone, went to the casino, got drunk all night, won hundreds of dollars, and then passed out in my room. The house cleaner walked in, and I just kind of walked out of the room because I didn't want to pay for another night. I tried to sleep on the toilet and then drove home hungover an hour later. Maybe I could have told a story that made me look better. Maybe it was that. Or maybe I should just stop having such negative expectations.
Let me lay out exactly what happened, because it's kind of awful — you can see what's coming already. Tuesday, I texted her a little funny dad humor. And maybe our senses of humor aren't aligned, because I like dark humor — Anthony Jeselnik, Bill Burr, Louis C.K., Kevin Hart, Deon Cole. I like dark, dirty, grimy humor, not dad humor, man. Dad humor sucks. But I sent her some dad humor Tuesday and she liked it. Wednesday, right after the call, she texts me. I send her some more dad humor. She liked that too. Then Thursday, she didn't message me all day, and keep in mind, Thursday I waited exactly to the minute. She texted me Wednesday at 8:22 p.m., so I texted her Thursday at 8:22 p.m. Your boy is trifling, just trifling. And then she sends me a nice message back like 30 minutes later. Friday, I text her and send her a picture of myself, and she sends kind of a mild reply. Friday night I send another message following up. She responds 12 hours later saying she's heading out and not going to be able to charge her phone for a couple of days — laughing emoji, probably good for me. Okay? At least as far as I can see, everything was good from there. That was Saturday.
And this is the question: why don't I text her? Why don't I reply Saturday? I don't know. Well, actually — I had this single mom, the one I did the video about titled that she canceled again seven minutes before our date. The single mom messaged me Friday night saying she was canceling. And meanwhile this other woman I'm trying to date is out of town. So I was kind of down on women and down on dating on Saturday, and I didn't text this woman. And also, I'm thinking: this is a grown woman, less than a handful of years apart from me in age — I was born in '84, so you can do some math. She's out with her family. Does she need me texting her?
“I'm Not Really Feeling the Connection”
So I don't text her for two days. Then her phone's off when I text her Monday. I don't hear from her Monday or Tuesday. I text her Wednesday. Let me get the messages back out and read this. Yesterday at 4:42 p.m., I texted: are you still camping or did you get back? First message back, 4:57 p.m.: done camping — and I'm not going to read her whole message, but then it continued: “By the way, I don't know how to be less abrupt about this, but I meant what I said about not wanting to waste your time or mine. You're a great guy, but I'm not really feeling the connection. With all your energy and insight, I suspect that's something you will understand. You deserve to find someone great and I hope you do, but I feel like that's not me.”
I'm just like — maybe it's my negative expectations, that I just expect at this point that every woman is going to text me that she doesn't feel the connection. And I know that's not going to be true for every woman. Even if it's 99 women, there's going to be one woman that's going to say, I do feel this connection. I'm just so tired of this. Like, what the hell? We had a great time in person. Why, when you're visiting your family, are you suddenly not feeling the connection?
So I send her a message back. I said, I understand exactly what you mean, and I felt some of that distance too — I just have a different read on what it means. I felt a great connection with you on the phone and even more when we were together in person. Now keep in mind, I sent this long message, but another woman sent me the same kind of message once and I didn't respond to her at all — never heard from her again. This time I'm like, I'm going to say my piece. This is ridiculous. I mean, it's reasonable — it's fine if she doesn't feel the connection, that's up to her. But I said, we felt a great connection on the phone and in person. Then you were traveling with your family. Connection needs time together, especially in person. That's why I'm confident a second date's worth it. Let's plan for a date.
Fourteen hours later, she says: I appreciate your wanting to give it more of a chance, but out of respect to both of our time, I'm going to say no. Good God. Like, what? Out of respect to both of our time — what, another hour or two? It's baffling. And I wonder: if I would have been more active with my texting, would it have mattered? Or was this just going to happen anyway? Are we just not compatible? I don't know.
So then I sent her a minute and 30 second voice memo. I said, look, I'm just curious. I'm trying to learn what happened, because I don't understand. My feelings are pretty consistent from one day to another, and that's maybe because I'm a man — and maybe that's why having a man is a good thing. I have feelings, and you can see some days I'm down and some days I'm up, but I know who I love. I know who I care about. I know what's true every day, even when I feel like crap. Sometimes maybe I do self-sabotaging things myself. But I'm like: is this woman self-sabotaging, or is this just an extreme emotion? Like she got in her head. I didn't text her for a couple of days and she got in her head about it. And instead of saying, hey, I'm hurt you didn't text me, she's like: I have to reject him. He can't be the one, this slow effort. He's a boy. I don't know.
So I sent her a message. I said, what happened? We had a nice first date. We had a nice phone call. You said effort was important to you. I didn't text you while you were out camping off the grid with your family. If I had it to do over again, I would text you faster. I'm just curious what happened from your point of view, so I can learn. No response to that.
I'm like, isn't there a better way to do dating? Couldn't we at least have some empathy? It just feels like people are so disposable. And then all the advice people are giving is, well, just go on Hinge, go on Tinder, go on Bumble, go on Match and get 50 more dates. I don't know if that's the answer either.
“She's Got Five Other Dudes” — No, She Doesn't
Then I talked to some guys about this woman, and they're like, well, that's because she has five other dudes that are texting her and she's got two other guys she's banging. I'm like, no, she doesn't — at least by the probabilities, based on everything she said. She doesn't have anybody else. That's why she went out with me. She was hesitant to even have a date in the first place. This is a woman who has a very full single life, who has been single most of her life. She's not on dating apps — she said she doesn't like dating apps and doesn't use them. She doesn't have 50 guys all trying to get with her.
Most of the women I'm going out with don't have a bunch of men. Now, my one guy friend is like, well, not that they're going to tell you about. And I'll grant that in some cases, yes, women have a bunch of guys interested in them. But most of the women I'm seeing don't, because they're doing this to every single guy all the time: we don't have chemistry, I'm not feeling a connection, we're just friends. The women I'm running into are just pushing me away, and I don't think I'm special — I think they're pushing a lot of guys away all the time. No, get away from me. No, not interested. Just constantly pushing people away. And then often, when they do let somebody in, it's a jerk — a jerk they then have a hard time pushing away, but eventually they push him away too.
At the same time, I have another date from matchmaking set up with a woman a week from now. So it's cool. It's cool. I'm cool with it. I can handle it. I'm a big boy. My goal is to learn and adjust my own behavior so that I feel good with how I'm acting. And I ask: what do I not feel good about? I don't feel good about how I approached this text game. I don't feel good about showing up to this date with a closed, wounded heart. I was not open hearted with this woman, and maybe that's what she felt — because the queen certainly felt how open hearted I was. She soaked that up until I didn't make the move on her when she was ready, at which point she spiraled and withdrew, and I spiraled, then we spiraled in the wrong directions. Which is fine, because I'm going to sell that video.
What My Mom Said
So the key lesson here, to me, seems to be about women these days — at least the ones I'm running into, and these are just my experiences. There are billions of women on the planet and I know very few of them. And I hear y'all saying, Jerry, go overseas, you'll have a different experience. I'm open to that. I'm excited to meet this next woman from the matchmaking service, and I'm going to plan to show up with a masculine frame and an open heart. This woman's profile looks amazing, and it says she values a guy that's a good communicator — which to me equals: she's going to want some significant, consistent attention on the phone. And I'm noticing this is at least the third, if not the fourth, woman that's ended things with me or flaked on me in proximity to me not being consistent with my messaging.
I talked to my mom about this. My mom's like, this is ridiculous. Why do these women want you to do so much? My mom was born in the fifties. She doesn't understand. She's like, I don't want anybody to text me that much. I'm like, Mom, it seems like the women I'm running into, at least, want a text every day, no matter whether they texted or not yesterday. They want a message every single day — which I'm happy to provide.
But then you've got all these guys on YouTube telling me, oh yeah, you're just a loser. The guy that sent her the good morning text — she's laughing at his text while she's banging some other dude. Okay, in some cases, maybe that's happening. But in a lot of cases, women are lonely, are not texting anyone, and have nothing going on. That's why they keep getting back with their ex. Because when they're alone, they have no options, so they go back to their ex again. This one woman I know got back with her ex like six, seven times — breaking up, getting back together. That's not a woman with options. That is a woman who's pushing everybody away, getting desperate, and going back to something that's not working.
For me, I at least want to feel proud of my own behavior. With the queen, I'm having to forgive myself for not kissing her when she wanted me to kiss her. With this last woman, I'm having to forgive myself for not opening my heart up and putting the effort in on the fucking phone. Like, can we just not date through these? Is this what we're doing? Is this what we have to do now? We can't just date face to face — we have to date through these fucking phones. I'm so sick and tired of it. I'd like to just go out with a woman: look, meet me here, at this time, this day, next week. We're not going to exchange numbers. There's no way to let me know you're canceling or flaking. I'm just going to show up, and you show up, and we don't have to talk on the goddamn phone all week.
But with the queen, she loved all that texting and flirting I was doing, and it felt so good. And then when I went out with her, she was very warm. It seems that's what women are expecting today. Not all women, but it seems like that's what I should be prepared to offer. And then I'm not some loser if I'm texting a woman consistently. Yeah, some women may interpret that as loser behavior, but that's probably not going to be a woman that's compatible with me. The woman that's compatible with me is probably going to want me to be obsessed with her, to text her all the time.
What My Ex-Wife Said
I'm wondering what you think is happening. Are these women spiraling, or maybe there's just not that much chemistry? I refuse to accept a lot of people's judgments, like, oh, you're just not that attractive. No — I'm attractive enough, because I see how women respond to me in person. Obviously not every woman falls over for me, but I remember being fat and overweight, and I get treated better now. I'm attractive enough that sometimes beautiful women are very excited when I approach them and start talking to them, and they're very ready to date me. So I know I'm good enough looking. It is not my looks that are causing women to behave this way, and it's not my money or my car. Women are going off of feelings — maybe less so on dating apps, but they're still going off feelings. And I'm generally going off of logic. But I'm disturbed that my own behavior was kind of irrational. It's almost as if I wanted this woman to do this. And that, to me, is the real thing. It's almost like both of us just wanted to go out with each other and then have it not work out — then she could complain about men and I could complain about women. But I really want something amazing to work out. I would love for this date I have a week from now to work out.
I was at a sober bar in Gulfport tonight, and there was a woman there. And again, guys — these narratives you hear about how all women just have all these guys? Maybe some of them do. Not a lot of the ones I'm meeting. I was at the bar with an attractive woman tonight, and the bartender is just beautiful. It's a sober bar — there are no alcoholic drinks — and I spent $40 there on two non-alcoholic drinks and like $20 or $30 in tips. And the one woman said she had not been out on a date in months, and the last date she had been on wasn't even good. It seems like women are generally enjoying the first date with me. So I'm like, where am I fucking up here? Because they're consistently scheduling second dates with me. They're consistently telling my matchmaker that I'm a four or five star date review. So what is happening?
It's like my phone game is weak, and I can improve my phone game. I know how to text and flirt with a woman. I knew how to do this stuff in 2009. This 19 year old dispatcher — me and her would sit there texting while she was in dispatch and I was on patrol as a police officer. Dude, we'd just text. We'd text all night. I remember one of the guys I worked with was like, bro, who the fuck are you texting? I'm like, I ain't telling you, you stupid ass. And then this dispatcher and I — I mean, she was a perfect 10. She was as beautiful as you could possibly imagine. And that was a great night when she came over, bro. Great, great night. I'll get back to her in a minute.
I hope my videos are leading by example. I went to my ex wife tonight, because we were at my son's baseball practice, and I'm like, why are these women so crazy? And she's like, these women are not crazy. They're just people, just like you. They're doing their best. And I'm like, well, why does their best seem like they're inauthentic? Why are they always self-sabotaging? Why do they have these expectations? And she said — or maybe I realized it as we talked — maybe I need to change the language and the ways I've been thinking about and judging women lately. I guess I need to change that. I've got some hurt, some resentment, some forgiveness I could offer.
And what's nice is, I feel very powerful. Because I'm figuring out what work I need to do to get what I want. What I want is an awesome, beautiful relationship. And some fun — I want some fun. I am trying to meet up with women to have fun and not take dating so heavy. But I also would love to have a woman — I want a woman that wants me to obsess over her, and I can obsess over her. And we'll text and we'll flirt all day, and then we'll go out on dates, and then we'll have lots of sex, and we'll have so much fun. We'll get in a relationship. I'll bring her on my videos and show her off. We'll have kids. We'll get married. And it'll be awesome. That's what I want. I'm also DTF.
The Dispatcher and the One More Text
I'm down to fucking just have fun until then. And it doesn't have to be forever. It doesn't have to be something perfect. Like with the dispatcher — I had one, and I wrote about her in my book Officer Banfield, which is on my website. That one night with her, I only got one fuck. And man, that was a good night. That was one of the best nights of my life. That was so good.
And what's funny is, the dispatcher is a perfect example of this shit I'm saying. The dispatcher — I texted her so much, obsessed over her, talked to her all the time, right? And my sergeant hooked me up, even though he said he was punishing me for my attitude — which had gotten more negative, so I could get on the dispatcher's wavelength. He stuck me in dispatch with her as a punishment. I swear he was trying to help your boy out. You know what I'm saying? He could see I wanted it. So he's like, well, I'm going to give this boy what he wants, and he stuck me in there with her. She was playing with her shirt button all night. I'm like, oh my gosh, she wants it bad.
The night that she came over — well, I was in dispatch with her Monday night, and I had been sure on Monday night: she's coming. We're both off work Wednesday. She is coming to my house Wednesday. It's going down. I'm yelling, Timber — going down. So the night she came over, I drank and played video games. Pre-gamed — well, not really pre-gamed, I just did that shit all the time when I was off. I think I went to the bar with my friends, or maybe I just sat and drank by myself all night playing video games. But I had texted her, and she said, I'm going to go see my friend, and then I'll come over and see you. I'm like, all right, cool, let me know. And that was at like 8 p.m. or something.
I hadn't heard back from her, and it was 1 a.m., and I had sent the last text message. Now, if I was doing some dumb shit like I was doing this week, that would have been the end of it. I had turned the lights off. I was ready to go to bed early as shit — I mean, I'd gotten up at like 4 or 5 p.m. because I was on night shift, and I'd drunk for most of that time playing Call of Duty. What were we playing? World at War? And I remember feeling so defeated. Like, fuck — how did all this plan not work out? I had all the lights off. I was sitting on my couch, holding my phone. And it's like: you've got to send one more text. Just send one more text.
So I got my phone out and I sent one more text. I said, hey, you still coming over? Now, a lot of the losers on YouTube will be like, oh, you can't double text, you're going to look desperate. This 19 year old — perfect, beautiful, I can't imagine a woman more beautiful than her, and I got to see all of her — she texts me back within five minutes. She's like, I'm coming over right now. I'll be there in 10 minutes. I'm like, oh, shit. It's going down.
And it was amazing. I felt so defeated, I sent one more text, and she immediately replies: I'm on the way over now, I'll be there in 10 minutes. Dude, I ran around. I turned the lights on. I picked up all the soda cans and cleaned my shit up. You should have seen me. I went from damn near ready to cry and just go to bed feeling defeated — I send one more text, hey, you still coming over? Boom. She texts right back: yep, be over right now. Like, why the fuck didn't she text me that on her own? I don't know. But she knew I wanted it. And she was sitting there getting in her head. And I'm like, look, get over here.
So she comes over, dude, and she leaves her phone in the car, because there was this other guy she was still exiting the situationship drama with. She left her phone in the car. I'm like, oh, she wants it bad tonight. She was wearing these black boots, blue jeans, and a black tank top — kind of like the one I wear, except it didn't have my fucking name on it. And boy, oh my God, it was on with her. We watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall. I had bought Captain Morgan for her, which was her favorite liquor. And damn — we only made it five minutes into the movie. Shit was so good.
Imagine If I Hadn't Sent That Text
And imagine — imagine if I hadn't sent that text. Maybe she didn't have a good night with her friend. Maybe she was already at home with her parents. Who knows what she was doing? Maybe she wouldn't have come over if I didn't send that text. But that text tells her: hey, I'm still thinking about you. Hey, I want you. Come on. Imagine what I'd have missed out on if I didn't send that double text at one in the morning.
And I did a vlog on my journey — Jerry Banfield channel. Every dating story like this one goes in my Dating playlist if you want to follow how this all turns out.
So I'm going to remember that going forward. I'm going to text the shit out of these women, unless they ask me to stop or unless they ask for space. I'm going to text the shit out of these women. You want to text? I'll fucking text you. Good morning. Good evening. Good afternoon. It's midnight. I just took a shit. I'm going to text the shit out of these women. Let them know: I'm obsessed with you. I want you. He wanted it — I can tell he wanted it.
All right, y'all. Spend enough time with me. Appreciate you — go to jerrybanfield.com.