Miss Shamrock
I used to “cruise” for dates at local beaches (such as they are) for the longest time, almost always without good luck.
A typical story took place at the unguarded, postage stamp-sized beach at East Medicine Lake Park in Plymouth, MN. Equipped with picnic tables and playground equipment for the whole family and bathrooms, changing areas, and a shower for all located in a fairly spiffy-looking green and yellow building with white trim, the beach hardly looks as glamorous as, say, Waikiki on Oahu. At least the patch of water which gets marked by a plethora of “swim area” signs in the good old summertime is cool and refreshing but not deep with “Diving prohibited due to shallow water” on the beach sign duly warning the empty-headed of the fact.
On the day in question the bright yellow sun cast its rays from a cobalt blue sky (whether any scattered clouds were around I don’t remember.) Perfect weather to lure pretty women out to catch some rays clad in the swimsuit style Monsieur Louis Reard created in 1946 and sparked my first crush ever on a girl I knew back when we were kids circa 1988. (Yes, Jessie G., I’m referring to you.) And when I got there I saw one possible date candidate, moved in, began chattering away, asked if I could join her after, like, two minutes of chit-chat, and introduced myself as I got set up after I got the okay.
From there the conversation ground on (me always having to provide the spark) until the inevitable occurred: the phrase “my boyfriend” entered her words in passing as I tried to spark a connection, which sent a frustrated stab into my belly.
By now another candidate had hit the beach nearby, so I politely excused myself with a “Have a nice day” and made the move brought me face to face with Miss Shamrock. A twenty-something beauty in a colorful blue halter top bikini with a large green shamrock on her neck.
I changed tactics a little by just grabbing some sand in easy voice range, did my best to gather my wits scrambled yet again by the dreaded “boyfriend” phrase, and finally looked at Miss Shamrock and said “Hi. How’s it going?”
She said something back like “Good. You?”
“Fine.” Then I introduced myself.
I made my first mistake shortly into our conversation by griping how I was “not doing so good” with women that day. “Well, you’re not doing so good here either,” Miss Shamrock needled me with a smarmy, smug giggle afterward. Not only had I blown my cool, I had allowed myself to get mocked by a girl who revealed her stuck-up personality in the process.
Still thick headed about the subtleties of men-women interaction after all those years of beach cruising, I doggedly kept going, asking her if she was Irish (grudging “yes” without a look my way). Where from?
(She gave a town whose name I’d never heard of.) Where is it in Ireland? (More monosyllables from Miss Shamrock.) Tried to keep it going, but only got a very chilly shoulder turning colder all the time. Ugh. I even tried telling her I wouldn’t take such treatment, especially since my father had been a jerk who’d done stuff like that. (She just gave me another smarmy, arrogant giggle. Geez, she liked torturing men, didn’t she?)
Finally, when I saw another possible date candidate, I excused myself with another “Have a nice day.” (No response.) and left … only to walk back by busted after a misadventure worthy of its own story.
I mumbled something to Miss Shamrock in a feeble attempt to restart the hopeless chat. But she just gave me a couple words back which dripped icicles and deserved a kick of sand if I had been bold enough to do it (which I wasn’t, natch.)
I left East Medicine Lake beach fuming.
Moral: don’t ever try to thaw an arrogant female like her no matter how much of a knockout she is. As Hall and Oates sang: “Watch out boy/she’ll chew you up,” because this type of woman is nothing more than a lovely-looking, stuck-up bully.