Dates From Hell, Ep. 1. "Happiness Is A Warm… Garage"
This is a true story. And like all true disaster stories, it started with optimism — the most dangerous of mindsets.
This is a true story. And like all true disaster stories, it started with optimism — the most dangerous of mindsets.
It was my first time using a dating app. Ever. I was single, and had been for a while — the kind of situation where your coupled-up friends start looking at you with pity mixed with suspicion, as if singledom were some sort of possibly contagious disease. My friend Julie decided the cure was an app. It’s different, she said. You’ll have fun, she said.
Spoiler: I didn’t.
Still, I was bored, so I gave it a go. I scrolled through the Roman male population: endless gym selfies, shirtless Vespa poses, the occasional man holding a dead fish (why?). Then I saw him. Francesco. Cute, in a bookish sort of way — but also a motorcycle in his photo. The perfect balance of wit and adventure.
Fuck it, I thought. I swiped right.
(Side note: why is “right” always the good one? Being right, right-hand man, Mr. Right. Meanwhile, left just gets stuck with communism and bad dancing. Anyway. I digress.)
We matched. He opened with “ciao, come stai?” — the dating-app equivalent of beige wallpaper. And let’s be honest, nobody who asks that question actually cares. It’s a reflex, like sneezing or politicians lying. I cut to the chase: “Coffee tomorrow?”
At the appointed café, I waited. He was late. Twenty minutes late.
When he finally showed up, I realized his profile photos had been taken sometime around the birth of Facebook. “Sorry,” he said. “Couldn’t find parking.”
“Parking? I thought you had a motorbike.”
“It’s broken.”
“Ah. Sorry to hear that. Can it be fixed?”
He blinked, as if the concept had only just occurred to him. “Now that you mention it… yes. I should get it fixed.”
“Now that you mention it, yes. I should get it fixed.”
Brilliant. My date has just discovered the wheel.
We moved on. “So, what do you do?” I asked.
“I’m unemployed.”
“That must be tough.”
“Not really. Truth is, I can’t be arsed to do anything.”
If I ever wished to have our Lord’s wine-generating power, it was then.
He leaned forward, suddenly eager. “You seem smart. You speak English and Italian fluently.”
“Thank you.”
“I only speak Italian. Luckily, they speak Italian everywhere.”
I choked on my coffee.
“…Sorry?”
“Yeah! Everywhere. I went to Budapest twice. At the Italian restaurant, they all spoke Italian.”
At this point I wasn’t sure if I was on a date or filming a hidden-camera prank show.
“So, do you live nearby?” I asked, praying for normality.
“No, I’m staying with my mum.”
He was nearly forty.
“I’m looking for a place,” he added, to my immense relief. “But I hate Rome,” he proclaimed. “Too loud, too hot.”
“You could move north?”
“No, people there are stuffy. And it’s cold.”
“The south, then?”
He frowned like I’d suggested exile to Siberia. “No way.”
“So… Rome, then.”
“Yes. But I need a garage. That’s the real problem.”
“A garage?”
“Yes. For the car. Can’t find anywhere with a garage. Except maybe…” he paused dramatically, “…Fiumicino.”
In case you’re not familiar: that’s the airport. Saying you want to live in Fiumicino to be in Rome is like saying you’ll live in Luton for the London nightlife.
At that point, I decided whether this was a joke or not, the punchline was me leaving.
And that, dear reader, is how my very first date from an app ended: with a forty-year-old man explaining that the only thing standing between him and happiness… was a garage.