This will make me no friends.
I was born in a town that was very working class. The only jobs were factory based, and most people were from the East End of London. The next town over was something else though. It was the stockbroker belt, full of people with money. The houses were nicer, the streets were nicer, and while we pretended otherwise, the people were nicer too. In fact, such was the envy of my town, we swore we would never sell out our working class roots to buy a house in this other place. Complete nonsense, of course, but it can sometimes help to pretend you don't want what you can't have.
So anyway, I attended a local youth center, and they had disco's once a week, and at one of these disco's a friend of mine met a girl from this other town. They seemed to hit it off, and they arranged a date for the following week. However, the condition was that her friend came along, and she would need a date too. So I ended up being drafted in. It was quite something, I was going to date a "rich person".
I was quite excited by the prospect, but nervous. I was nowhere near as cultured as all that, and I didn't even know if I had anything in common with her. But I really wanted it to work, desperate really, such is the folly of youth.
So the night arrived. We were going to take the bus to this town and meet the girls in the High Street. We turn up, and my buddy was getting along with his girl very well, walking ahead of us, laughing and joking. I was in the rear with my blind date. Immediately I sensed she was not impressed, but that just made me want to impress her all the more. She was pretty, smart, and more than I could ever have expected. I tried to be funny, I tried to impress, but it was a bit of an uphill struggle.
Now, this town had a huge public park in the center of it. It was beautifully kept, and had a vast lake in the middle. My buddy was doing good, and they wanted to go there, so we agreed. On arrival, we took our place on a park bench while the other couple kept walking and having a good old time (as far as I could make out).
By the time I was getting nervous. My date wasn't interested, and the longer it wen5t on the more obvious it became. I was desperate. I may be on my last leg, but I was willing to do anything to make her swoon. My mind was racing, what could I do to impress her, or make her feel our time together was special? The sun was going down, there was a slight chill in the air. My buddy had disappeared, and I needed a hail mary to save the day.
It was then that I had a blinding flash of brilliance. By now it was dark, and a full moon was rising. So I figured, why not suggest a walk to the lake? In the moonlight it would be quite romantic, and she would see that for all the rough edges, I could really deliver some romance. So we set off. Of course, she was still not impressed, and the conversion was a little stilted, but I was determined to make it work.
And you know what? The lake WAS romantic. The moon was high and it reflected on the surface in that Hollywood way. We were walking on the grass as we approached the lake, and I could take the attention from myself by simply talking about the beauty and the ambiance. It truly was perfect.
Which, of course, it right when I should have quit trying to impress, but being a young man, and being smitten by this girl from the other side of the tracks, a whole lot seemed to sit on making this just perfect. And what could be even more perfect than this? Why, throwing a pebble into the lake and watching the moon light up the ripples! How perfect would that be? And as luck would have it, I could just make out in the darkness a rock near the bank of the lake. I had to take my chance.
As we passed the rock I reached down to pick it up. A million emotions hit me at that moment. From the excitement of impressing this young lady, to having a plan actually work, and my youthful ego getting a boost. If this didn't melt this girl, nothing would. And that was when fate stepped in. Because as I reached for, and grasped that rock, I immediately knew that my worst nightmares had decided to become real. I knew immediately, this was no rock. I also knew what it actually was - a big pile of dog poo.
Reasoning had nothing to do with it. The final nail had been driven into the coffin of this date, and before long the entire town would know of this guy who tried to impress a bland date with a handful of s**t. The only saving grace was a) It was dark; b) I was near a big body of water in which to panic and go wash my hands. Not that the act of cleaning myself was going to save this date. Before long my lady was shouting out for her friend: "It's time to go home!"
And who could blame her? What lesson did I learn? Not much, other than don't try to woo a girl with feces. Obviously, I never saw her again, and having had his fun, even my mate didn't see his lady more than once more. I think I'd torpedoed the entire thing.
