New Years 2008 - The Flipside of the Philandering Coin

After such an arduously long, and admittedly heavier Part 1 of Tanzania, I've decided to reward you all with a quick tale. This is my story of New Years Eve, 2008.

I had met Sophie in Lviv during a typically wild, well-imbibed weekend. She was visiting along with her boyfriend, a short, likable chain smoker from Vienna, as she was. Rolph didn't speak much English, while Sophie's English was near-perfect. It was adorably tinted with the accent and occasional subject-verb disagreements that are common to western Europeans who are erstwhile trying to expand their vocabulary through the repeated use of words they have read in their extensive English book collection. "Rolph does have a very profound passion to smoke the cigarettes." Who can't love that?

Sophie's humor was uncanny. I am not particularly sure if she intended as many jokes as I and everyone else found, but should that even matter? Funny is funny. People like funny. After several days of the three of us and ol' Ed Burns hanging out, I began to develop a real attraction to Sophie. Ed creepily confirmed her status as attractive in such a way that only Ed Burns can: "She's plenty a good place to pahhk yaw sausage wagon, Brian." Ed often punctuated his sentences with a person's name for emphasis. He also told her he'd lick her feet. I'm not sure what kind of punctuation that needs.

One evening after many shots of vodka and Rolph in bed nursing an oncoming illness, Sophie tells me about her rocky relationship with Rolph. About how he's quite jealous and how she feels "unable to sustain the facade of this caring nature" any longer. She said more stuff too, but once I processed those words, my brain switched from interested conversationalist to conniving homewrecker, and I stopped listening entirely.

There was much dancing and flirting. Sophie was an extraordinarily poor dancer -- picture a drunk autistic child with anger management issues controlling a marionette -- she is that marionette. Amid the flailing and gyrating that could only be meant to interpret the soundtrack of a violent rape was the spliced-in time-warp scenes of me circling the club in search of other (more immediately unattached) women of casual morality. I found none, but at some point Sophie went back to her hostel bedroom and I was left with Ed Burns as we took yet another taxi through the McDonald's drive thru lane, only to chastise one another the following day. This was a common pattern, insofar as Ed and I shared a love for late night food and the inevitable remorse that comes with it.

At some point over the next several days, Sophie leaves, while leaving me with her email address. What this served to accomplish is to kick off perhaps the longest email flirtation in the history of email flirtations. Most people (sensibly) don't even bother engaging in such things. I, on the other hand, view written dialogue, be it text, email or Facebook as an integral part of the wooing process. It's nearly foreplay, really. The difference being that the duration as measured in quantity of words is inversely proportional to the number of minutes needed to complete the coitus thereafter. Which is nice. Especially since it don't cost nothin'.

Not surprisingly, this method works in reverse as well. It serves as an incubator for the inexorable sexual tension of a third date. At least for me. Then again all my third dates have inexorable sexual tension as my strength to keep from staring at boobs finally wanes. That's a lot of time spent pretending to be interested in things other than boobs.

Sophie and I trade 35 emails over the course of the next 4-5 months. They are of varying lengths, though tending more toward the full page length, each requiring an immense amount of effort and thought. Several are quite a bit longer. Her written English, for a girl of 20 for whom this is a second language, is far better than just about anyone I know, and that includes myself. Many times I found myself looking up words like "metagenesis" (My family has a metagenetic history; I do not believe my mother to have ever had sex) and "contrapuntal" (Rolph and I were merely contrapuntal). I mean, what the fuck? Shouldn't her default be words like "stuff" and "shit?" That stuff is the easiest shit to say.

I agree to fly Sophie from Vienna to Tel Aviv so we can hang out in Israel for about 8 days around the New Year. Aggressive? Yes. Then again, my worst New Years Eve ever would prove to be the following year in which the tale of failure included a date with a girl I'd met once before, some recreational drug use and its inevitably painful aftermath, so one might say the payoff for my impulsiveness is your reward.

Sophie arrives and I am actually somewhat uncertain as to where we stand. Are we pen pals? Just pals? Scissor pals? I prefer the latter. The first night we head out in Old Jerusalem and it appears clear my hopes are well received. Although she kisses somewhat like a crazy person, it isn't all bad and is quite enjoyable. In other words, the enthusiasm is appreciated. And let's face it, there's a lot to be enthusiastic about when a worldly stud of my esteem flies you to the most religious clutch of the world for a week of sinful influence. I'm saying you should put out, that's all I'm saying.

The sex is of a frantic nature, much like that of a crazy person. And sad as it is to say, I have some experience in this arena. Alarms are starting to sound that perhaps a theme is taking shape, although the lure of her high-minded philosophical discourse sprinkled in between all the crazy is too much to ignore. I have been weak when faced with the sweet seduction of words ever since a drunken high school party where Shana Bazelmens somehow managed to convince me that love was a worthwhile pursuit at the age of 16, 18 years later, I would know only too well how tangibly possible such ideologies could be. At 16 however, they seemed absurd. Still, Shana Bazelmens remained my dream girl for a short while afterward, and the electricity conducted by her philosophies remained with me each time I would connect with a woman on that level for several years. In cases such as with Sophie, this can affect my judgment considerably.

The following day, we walk through the various quarters of the Old City exploring, among other places, the Armenian History Museum. While upstairs in yet another room full of 18th century things from places in, near, or sounding like Armenia, we slipped behind a hanging carpet where Sophie offered her thanks for the flight ticket from Vienna. Let's just say that it's a good thing we were in the Armenian History Museum. Judging by the low patronage, it seems clear that no one cares much about them.

I was really starting to like Sophie. Public displays of lewdness aside, our connection was real for both of us. She spent much time explaining her thoughts on life, and on herself. Her introspective depth was mature beyond that of anyone I had ever met. She analyzed me and my idiosyncrasies (calling them "idiosyncratic moments") accurately and without judgement. She was utterly perplexed by my desire to see the world -- not that she didn't identify with it, but more by what drove me to be this way when I'd never been on a plane until the age of 23. This degree of intellectuality was beginning to appeal to me more and more. I was actually having thoughts of what the possibilities could be for us to be together in New York. Would she move there? She said she wanted to live there. But, who doesn't? Point is, I was thinking about it. As I zipped up.

New Years Eve comes around. My plan is to hit a proper club in Tel Aviv, but I hear of an underground DJ rave outside of Jerusalem and change course. If there is one thing a traveler will drop everything for, it is anything involving the word "underground." Underground poetry reading? YES. Underground pottery class? Definitely. Underground Thai boxing to the death? Fuck. Yes. DJ rave was happening.

We get rather drunk on vodka (after all, it is over vodka that we met in the first place) in our room amid some more awkward sex (though less awkward than before) and we may have even smoked some hash I had leftover from Turkey. I was probably so high I didn't even notice. Upon our arrival at the converted warehouse where this debacle was about to take place, we notice most of the people streaming inside are of the "dirtier, hippier" persuasion. Personally, I have no problem with this. Sophie does not like hippies. Must be the German in her.

We quickly down two double-vodka / random-mixers and after more discussion of yet more articles of our philosophy, I convince her that we should head away from the bar and into where the real party was happening. I really wanted to dance, jump, lose control, and generally do the things you do at raves. Those things do not usually include solving the issue of why you can't seem to initiate a real relationship with your parents. Time and place, Sophie; time and place. It is party time. And I *really* love to party.

Once we are inside the heaving, undulating throng of exploding appendages, I immediately get the sense that Sophie is extremely uncomfortable. The dancing, I am sure, is part of this. Really, I had never before or since seen a more horrendous dancer. She kept trying to dance on me. Grinding, maybe? I wasn't really sure what it was, but I kept my eye out for any necessary medical equipment nearby should she take it the next 1% and slip into a full-on epileptic fit. With that search concluded with the realization that a bungee cord and a lighter would likely suffice, I really just wanted a bit of time to dance and enjoy my drunkenness and have a good time. Truth is, all of her gyrating was quite cute, really. What wasn't cute however, was what I saw next.

After some time (five, *maybe* seven minutes??) I had lost sight of Sophie. After a bit of casual searching without foregoing my good time, I find her thrashing about on some other guy's groin. I'm actually relieved. Someone else is providing her the attention that to this point in the past seven minutes I had been unwilling to provide. I resume dancing and am actually having a slightly better time knowing that I have some actual time to enjoy what I came to enjoy. After some time, I look back over my shoulder and shake my head twice to clear whatever cobwebs may have created the image in front of me. It is confirmed. She is swallowing some *other* guy's face. I take a moment and consider how she and I must have looked when she had done the same thing to me in prior days, and it is frankly rather appalling.

Almost immediately I regret the entirety of my decision to bring her to Israel for New Years. This is a superiorly gifted intellectual, with the comfortability in her skin of a self-loathing transsexual. This somewhat explained the overexuberance to have sex or make-out with just about anyone. It also explained why eight days is way too many to spend with someone whom you really only know through written words on the internet. When they're not near their computer, they may be neck deep in crazy. That seemed like as good a New Years resolution as any, and so I vowed never to do this again. Until the following year. (Again, a story I will tell soon).

I wait and try to enjoy myself while I stave off the need to urinate. When that urge became unbearable, I tap her on the shoulder and calmly ask her if she'd like another drink, at which point she unhinges herself from the very breed of hippie she hates and follows me towards the bathroom. I don't much feel like talking to her, and I'm quite sure she senses this. I am realizing slowly that I am actually *responsible* for this girl, and her parents would rightfully castrate me had I decided to leave her behind. Which, if not for her age, I would equally be rightful in doing. Quite a pickle.

We go our separate ways at the bathroom, where there are far more men than women in line waiting on either side of a shared sink console. While in line I send out the obligatory "happy new year" text to my friends back in New York punctuated with "you have got to be having more fun than I am," essentially admitting defeat. Once I am done on the men's side of the bathroom, I emerge to find Sophie mauling some *other* sloppy hippie ON THE SINK. What the fuck, really?? I can't leave this girl alone for even FIVE FUCKING MINUTES without her needing to scissor some guy on top of the only dirty sink in a dirty converted warehouse full of the very dirty hippies that she professes to hate? Really? This is my nightmare.

I take her by the hand and lead her out of the rave. This is enough. If it were possible (and economically feasible) I would have put her on the first plane to Vienna that departed Tel Aviv in 2008. Having already sunk enough money into this adventure though, I opted to bring her back to our crappy hotel and tell her in the taxi ride how much this night SUCKED MY ASS.

It didn't matter. She was blathering on about something about being sorry or maybe it was that I should be sorry? She explained "I am sorry. I am not an elegant person." Which was kind of adorable. And then she fell somehow and split her lip open. I think she fell off the bed, but I was so drunk who could tell? Who cares. I wanted this night to end.

The next day, we are sharing a miserable meal as I am trying to explore the psychology of what would ever make her act that way. I am understanding that she is indeed only 20 years old, and lord knows I was probably making out with another guy's girl countless times when I was that age. Ok, maybe I can count them, but maybe it happened more than twice, so I can at least break even? I hope so. She asks me if I still like her, to which I respond, "I like you... I just like you a lot less than I did before yesterday." I could see that statement land with impact. She was hurt now. And we still had three days more to go. She'll need to conjure up all that isn't elegant in her to make them bearable.

We suffer through the next few days and she finally leaves. We may have had sex again, but if we did it certainly wasn't terribly memorable insofar as it was clearly a "throw each other a bone" type deal. Literally, an exchange for the pain and awkwardness we were each forced to endure over that period.

We've stayed in touch, although clearly we both used it as a learning experience that we'd rather not relive. At least I did. I'm not sure I can say the same for her. She sounds just as crazy as she ever was each time I hear from her. And honestly, I kind of like that she stayed true to her crazy roots. See? She really does know who she is. And I like that.

Truth is, I do think about her from time to time and hope she's doing well. Just not better than me.

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