Kissing cousins?

                                                         

The following is a true story.  The names have been changed and a poetic license has been applied, even though I don’t legally have one. Yes, I failed the exam a few times, but I can do this.

While going to my local Walgreens (where I get my paycheck directly deposited weekly), the young clerk “Mohammad” keeps trying to court me.   It doesn’t matter that he’s a Muslim , twenty years my junior and possesses a limited  vocabulary, he is as persistent  a preacher at an atheists’ convention.  I tactfully begin to reject him by informing him that I have grown children that are his age and that I am an orthodox Jew and ardent Zionist to which he scoffs “We are in America, I don’t care about such things and you are SO beautiful”!  (He had me at “ Walgreen’s employee discount”).  

Impulsively, I hand the Arabian cub my business card and exit the store just in time to miss him reciting the exact same thing to the next customer (maybe those are the only English words he knows?) I’m presuming that  “the chase with no follow through” is a universal concept, but I’m wrong.  Fifteen minutes later I get a text from the forbidden foreigner. (ok, it’s a bit dramatic, but I love alliteration).

"I think you look like a movie star” reads the text.  I already know this is going to be an extremely cerebral conversation.  I vacillate between ignoring and responding, depending on what time of the month it is.  So I respond. “Hey, I’m really too old for you, but I’m flattered that a young man is flirting with me.”  The stars must be aligned because my bimbo auto correct writes “Farting” in lieu of “flirting”.   We’re off to a great start. 

As testosterone fueled young men do, he begins to incessantly text me throughout the evening. I tell him, I’m an old Jew with carpal tunnel syndrome and that I can’t keep up and so I decide to resolve this complex dilemma by returning to the scene of the initial scandal. I even channel “Olivia Pope”and wear a killer outfit with an expression on my face that looks like I’m sucking a lemon. It was time for some damage control.

There behind the counter he floats, a sculpted, exotic tall ,”trayf” mochachino vision in a cobalt shirt, provided to him by the manager.  His lashes are as thick and luxurious as Kim Khardashian’s extended ones and his hair parts and dips as beautifully and gracefully as Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers at their peak, but the piece de resistance?( And I MUST resist this)  the generous smile that crinkles the corner of his eyes with nary a smidgen of the appearance of crow’s feet.  Oh, the juicy, stress free, unlined face of youth.  I’m totally depressed.

The confrontation is abruptly aborted due to a spillage issue in aisle 5. It seems a toddler was knocking over some candy and then proceeded to express his creative talents by painting a Reese’s pieces mural on the back wall of the store. Not an environment to stand my ground and display my power point presentation on why I can’t date this suitor.  I would surely end up on America’s most wanted for statutory rape or be ex-communicated by my family, like my poor Uncle Alan, who married three shiksas and is on his third wife,  who is 40 years younger than him and from Thailand.  I had to complete my mission, so I  grab a bottle of Centrum “Senior” and strut over to the counter.

“You bought the wrong vitamins, maybe you did not notice”? He sweetly admonishes me 

I reply “No, I haven’t, I’m keeping it, because I’m going to need it very soon”.

With that I continue “Listen, I’m sorry if I misled you, but I can’t go out with you, though you are very sweet.”

“It’s because I’m Palestinian isn’t it?  To which I respond, “NO, it’s because you’re like 20”?

“Don’t you know we are cousins”?  First cousins!” he proclaims.

I think he just solved the entire middle east crisis in that sentence, but I say “ I don’t date my first cousins, even if they are removed a couple of generations, It’s not healthy. Our children can have three heads”.

He laughs and I get tingly all over because he laughs at my jokes, but I still remain firm, leave the store and move on to the next battleground –the supermarket, where all the guys there call me “Mami” .  Do they have to keep reminding me of my age?

Maybe one day my age appropriate prince will arrive.  He probably will be a card carrying member of the AARP and have torn meniscus, but at least I won’t feel like I’m kidnapping my date and feel compelled to take him to Chuck E  Cheese.  Meanwhile, there’s always some sweet young man who figures that an older woman is “easy”.  How little do they know!