Nice guys don't always finish last

On Valentine's Day, I had a first date with a guy named Dave. I had a great time, and how could I not? He cooked me dinner (filet mignon), had the chef at his golf club make chocolate-covered strawberries....plus, he was a very funny, very sweet guy. Oh, and did I mention that he's successful? He's the superintendent at a golf club in Naples; in fact, he was just made a finalist for Golf Club Digest's superintendent of the year. (Pretty amazing, huh?) We hung out a couple more times after that, and by Sunday, it was obvious that he was really into me. I should have been on cloud nine, right?

If you said "right," then you obviously have not been reading this blog for very long (or you just haven't been paying attention). That would be too easy, people! Dave was a nice, sweet, sincere, caring guy. I HAD NO IDEA WHAT TO DO WITH A GUY LIKE THAT. I'm not used to that shit. If you know me at all, you know that I talk about wanting to find a great guy and settle down, but as soon as one comes along, I lose interest--or, more to the point, get scared. See, it's easy to date the jerks. It's safer. Yes, your heart will inevitably get trampled on, but at least there's no real risk of the TRULY scary part--finding someone you could really be with and start a future with. Someone who might actually be able to MAKE your dreams come true. To me, there's nothing scarier than that. Because that, you see, is when you actually let down your guard and let someone in. That's when you have to let them see the real you. Which is why I've been pushing guys away for years. And the NICE ones, with no drama or issues, the ones who treat me nicely? Pshaw. Not interested. If there's anything I've learned over the years, it's that RELATIONSHIPS NEED DRAMA.

So, Dave comes along and for the first few dates, I wasn't sure what to make of him. I mean, I loved hanging out with him, but he was just so NICE, and so sweet, and sometimes I wanted to hit him over the head and tell him to grow some balls. He'd say something romantic and I'd get uncomfortable. It got to the point (as many of you know via various emails) that I was about ready to break it off. "He's awesome and I have so much fun with him," I said, "but he's so NICE. So BLAH. I don't think there are any sparks."

As it turns out, there are. They're just a different kind of sparks. The kind that comes from slowly getting to know someone, the kind that develop as you get to see new parts of their personality, a little at a time. The kind that come when you become attracted to someone for who they are and not what they look like. The "sparks" I've always had before were based on pretty much the physical stuff--and that's what drove me and kept me in the relationship, even when it became clear that the guy was a jerk. This is a new kind of spark.

We spent a lot of time together this weekend, and I can now officially say--WOW. What an amazing, amazing man. I already care enough about him to have explained to him about Dysfunctional Jen, my evil twin, and how in the past, she's had a hard time dealing with the good guys. So every now and then, when the niceness is getting to be overwhelming, I'll tell him so and he'll call me a sufficiently sarcastic name, and all is well again. =-) He loves the fact that I can be incredibly sweet and a huge smartass, sometimes in the same sentence. "You have an edge to you," he said. He tried to tell me that HE had an edge, too, to which I replied that he was about as edgy as the Pope.

The best part of the weekend was when he was teaching me how to play Texas Hold 'Em on Saturday. (He has a monthly poker game, and we're now in training for me to get ready for the March one.) This guy LOVES poker and he's pretty good at it. After he showed me the basics, we started to play for real: and my sweet, nice Dave became a hardcore player. We talked shit to each other and went for the jugular. He took no mercy on me and, I'm proud to say, I was able to wipe him out a few times. (And I'd do it with this fake kind of innocence: "I have all shovel thingies. Is that good?" I'd say as I laid my cards down and he cussed a blue streak.) It was AWESOME.

Anyway...I don't know what will happen and, for once, I'm trying to just enjoy it as it happens and not think too far ahead. (Although I will say that he's the first guy I've dated since my Psychic Adventure with Anna a year and a half ago that actually fits the description of "the one," pretty much to a T.) As I'm learning, though: sometimes nice guys aren't all that bad.