Went on first date in 2 years. The ‘blind’ kind set up by a friend.  We take my quick lunch window that is open between work and picking up Jeb at school. He is divorced, 40 and working on an organic farm in exchange for a lean – to. Nice man. Earthy. No vehicle. I pick him up. He’s wearing a loud print new-age version of an aloha shirt that is well worn and permanently wrinkled at the collar. A detail that seems to have been overlooked for some time. His shanty shack is made up of reflective tarps on one side of a plywood platform that houses a thin mattress beneath a mosquito net. Permanently red dirt stained grey-white socks hang on a line above the “bed”. Dirty underwear and shorts from the morning’s work still lay on the ground. Books pile in a corner haphazardly.

My brain does a quick data scan taking in the scene and in under 2 minutes it is determined no intimacy will take place between he and I. We have not yet gotten into my car.

The blade-style sunglasses and straw pseudo-fedora only punctuate my speedy conclusion.

He pays for lunch, graciously. Even gets me a second helping of water. Conversation: not bad. He has a post office errand to run and he also wants to get a coffee at the bakery. I get the sense he’s wanting to maximize his rare run to town as he cannot get there freely and rarely leaves the farm. Walking to the coffee shop, post lunch, a juicy round fart escapes his shorts. Though it sounds like it may have slipped (which has it’s own connotations) I wonder if I’m being tested or if he’s just the “free it up” kind of guy who lets them rip and doesn’t apologize or excuse himself. I continue walking, pretending for my sake and his that I heard nothing.