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Tuesday, Jun 16, 2009 10:19 AM UTC

He e-mailed us to say, “I’m dating both of you”

I thought I liked this guy, but his message to me and the other woman he's dating seemed pretty tacky.

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Topics: Since You Asked, Motherhood, Coupling,

Dear Reader,

Well, I scattered my mom’s ashes up on the mountain where she lived the better part of 25 years. Friends came. We went to church. We went to dinner. We got ticks. My mom would have liked the tick part. She would have said she told us to stay out of the high grass and keep our pants tucked into our socks.

Dear Cary,

I value your advice and read your column all the time. Anyway, after a long hiatus, I dove into the dating pool. I heard that my longtime friend Bob’s cute brother Sam was newly single. I sent him a card telling him that if he’d like to see a movie sometime or have lunch to call/e-mail me. Bob cautioned me that Sam was newly divorced and maybe I shouldn’t take action. I decided to anyway, even though I respect Bob’s opinion about most things.

Anyway, I really fell quickly for Sam. We couldn’t see each other very often because we live two hours apart and as a single parent I could only arrange to see him maybe once a month at most. The few times we saw each other lasted for several hours … we had so much to talk and laugh about — incredible chemistry … and we had frequent e-mails/phone calls in between … it seemed like we had a rare connection, at least to me anyway.

Then, I get an e-mail that he just started seeing someone that lives in his building. Now, get this, he e-mails me and Suzy on the same e-mail at the same time … as in “Margaret and Suzy, I am seeing you both … like you both … want it all out in the open …” I thought this was in really poor taste … didn’t seem to go with the thoughtful person I knew.

Anyway, I tried to be classy because, well, he could have continued seeing both of us and maybe I wouldn’t have found out … so in a weird way, I did appreciate his clumsy honesty. I told him that I couldn’t see him while he was seeing someone else; physically and emotionally I just wasn’t cut out that way and I wished him well.

He has since e-mailed me that I was the most genuine person he has ever met and that his time with me couldn’t be compared, and he signed it “Love, Sam.” Part of me wondered, What the heck does this mean? But the logical side of me decided to just ignore the e-mail.

Not sure if I will ever hear from him again, but I do miss him. If I do hear from him, is he worthy of another chance? I think so, but sometimes I have such huge rose-colored glasses on when it comes to romance that I set myself up to get slam-dunked. And I felt so sad about all of this.

This guy made me wonderful dinners. Made me CDs of my favorite songs. Loved to slow dance … I felt so at ease with him … but since he decided to see someone else I have to wonder if it was all BS.

I hate to think so. What do you think, being a man and all?

Puzzled

Dear Puzzled,

What I think, being a man and all, is that sometimes women spend too much time trying to figure out what we men are up to and not enough time trusting their own judgment. I think you’ve already decided what to do. That e-mail struck you as manipulative and invasive and strange, and it put you off.

Yet you crave his attention. Craving his attention is not a good basis for a relationship. Craving his attention is like needing a drug. He made you a nice dinner. He says nice things to you. Those things — the slow-dancing, the CD, the dinner — those are not the relationship. They are relationship-oriented products. He has shown himself to be an adequate producer of relationship-oriented products. You haven’t really encountered him as a person yet; you’ve only encountered him as a competent dispenser of feeling-like substances.

Not to say that all courtship behavior is a sham. Courtship behavior and its attendant relationship-oriented products make it safe for men and women to dance together. But within the slow dance and the dinner is supposed to be some relating. You have to sense there’s a man you like in there somewhere. I’m not sure you do. I feel more like you were so fragile and hungry that you fell for the appearance of something — for the relationship-oriented products he is able to produce. And that puts you in a dangerous spot because, as you say, you are a person who has such “huge rose-colored glasses on when it comes to romance that I set myself up to get slam-dunked.”

Some people call that “having boundary issues.” Having boundaries is about knowing your weaknesses and protecting yourself.

There’s nothing wrong with feeling fragile and hungry. It happens. We’re in a fragile, hungry time. I suggest, however, that you never allow yourself to become so fragile and hungry that you go against your own core values and instincts.

As a man, I can tell you that sometimes when we want a woman to do something, we produce our best relationship-oriented products and present them to her as if they represented our current feelings toward her. But what they actually represent is how we think we might feel once we get what we want from her. Once we get what we want from her, we might feel like a slow dance, like a diamond, like a rare filet mignon. But in the beginning it’s not poetry; it’s sales. Relationship is knowing and accepting another person. You have to like the guy. He has to not creep you out.

So what do you feel about a person who would send the kind of e-mail he sent? Some people might actually like it. But I think your reaction was like the reaction many women would have, which was that it was just tacky and strange. So trust your own response. I think you’ve already decided what to do.


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What? You want more advice?

 

Cary Tennis

Cary Tennis writes Salon's advice column and leads writing workshops and retreats.

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