Day 13: Unlucky In Love

This has been the first bad day of the project. And really, it has nothing to do with the project itself. It has to do with the foulest of all of our dirty little four letter words: life. The story, as most sad stories do, begins with, "I met a woman." But unlike the usual ending, "She hurt me," this one ends with, "I hurt her."

What's funny is that we had never even dated, let alone kissed. We had met a couple of times and exchanged numerous phone and email conversations. To say I was smitten would be an understatement. She was beautiful, smart, talented, and -- probably most appealing of all -- she actually liked me.

But as we got to know each other better, it became clear that we had almost nothing in common. Also, compared to her lifestyle -- both past and present -- I felt provincial, and even worse, downright square. In many ways I'm still that little boy from Wood Village, Oregon. Only now I've got hair on my wiener.

Speaking of which, our first date was scheduled for tonight. And though I knew we wouldn't have sex, I'm pretty sure there would have been some hand holding over dinner, and some making out later in one of our cars. Which means we would have eventually had sex. Which means I would have fallen in love with her. Which means that the Happiness Project would have failed.

I'll tell you why tomorrow. (Apparently blog visitors are incapable of reading anything that takes more than a minute to finish.)