Personal Ad Tangle: Kald

I didn't know how to refer to this woman. I couldn't really call her a tease, because that wasn't what she did. She was a bit of a mess, so I thought the best way to describe her was as a tangle.

I responded to Kald's ad. She was in her early 30s. When we talked on the phone, she said that she was divorced and had children, but didn't have custody of them. She was rather eager to meet in person ASAP, so we agreed to meet at Lestat's in about an hour. I actually liked it when the women wanted to meet in person right away. I had found that women who put it off a couple of days or were going to wait for a few more phone conversations were the ones who were most likely to cancel at the last minute.

I arrived at Lestat's first. I sat down and waited close to the sales counter. This was in the middle section, where I couldn't see the front door. I saw a woman come in looking around. I only saw her from the back at first and thought that she had really nice-looking hair. It was long, blonde, straight and clean. As soon as she turned around and saw me, I discovered that was the only positive thing about her.

She wasn't ugly, but you could tell that life had taken a toll on her. Her eyes were rather recessed and she had dark circles underneath. One of her wrists was swollen like a carpel tunnel opened up into a highway. She was probably very pretty a long time ago, but those days were so long gone.

She told me about all the stuff that had happened to her in the last few years and so much of it was bad. She said she had been working as a cashier at a drug store and they fired her for no reason. (But she didn't give what reason they had to fire her.) It almost seemed like she was relieved to have the burden of motherhood taken away from her. I got the idea she needed a lot of help that she was expecting a man to provide for her, but I didn't think that anyone would ever feel that way about her. Even if she was a lot more attractive, I still would have paid attention to all these red flags.

During our conversation, I indicated that we were not going to have any kind of a relationship. I hoped that she would appreciate the honesty, because I had no intention of ever talking to her again. She tried soliciting advice from me, but I didn't even know where to start. All I could do was hope she'd seen as much rejection as I had and that she would know to stay away. But I did try to be friendly at that time.

I never did hear from her again. I don't know where she is now. A couple of days after I'd met her, Abed told me about some woman from San Diego who was talking to Howard Stern on his radio show. She said that she didn't have custody of her children. Howard commented that a woman would have to be pretty messed up to lose her kids. I don't know if that was Kald (and I don't think it was), but I did have to agree with that sentiment.