Stood Up

In this day and age, of text messaging, facebook, twitter, msn, e-mail, and cell phones is there ever any legit excuse for standing someone up?

I’m not talking about a last minute cancelation but a full throttle not showing up for a date! Why? I do not understand the mental process behind standing someone up.

Typically, a date plan doesn’t just spring out of thin air. Dialogue goes into it. The two people converse back and forth. It’s not like the plans just create themselves. After having gone to the trouble of getting to know the person (a little or a lot, depending on the circumstance), and making arrangements why would someone just choose to not show?

Personally, I think this is a good example of the difference between an asshole and a psycho. An asshole calls anywhere from a few days before the date to a few minutes before the date. Perhaps it’s not the most honorable thing to do, but it’s a lot better than taking the psycho route of simply vanishing into thin air. I question one’s sanity when he or she is able to do this especially, as mentioned above, in this technological age. To stand someone up not only means ditching them on the day of the date, but also immediately deleting them from any networking connection. The stand up-er has to avoid the stand up-ee both in the real world and in cyber space. It seems like a lot of hoops to jump through when you could just send a simple text message, “Sorry, I can’t do the date after all. Take care.”

In addition, I have to restate my concern that stand up-ers may have some psychological issues. Do they get some sort of high from imagining another person being stood up? For example here is a completely hypothetical situation:

Jane had been introduced to Rob through a mutual friend. They’d never met in person, but had started talking over MSN. They lived half an hour apart so it wasn’t immediately necessary that they make plans for a date. Rob added her to facebook, and they spent about 3 weeks getting to know one another in the cyber world (no, not like “that”… dirty minded readers). By the fourth week they were talking on a regular basis and had clearly hit it off. They decided to make plans for an official date. Jane suggested they meet at a cute coffee spot about half way between them. Rob agreed and suggested the date and time. Jane gave him her phone number. The plan was that he would text her when he was leaving and they’d meet at the coffee shop. The day of the date came like every other. Jane didn’t hear from him all morning, but was not concerned as this was not out of the ordinary. They were supposed to meet at 7:00 pm, but at ten to seven she started to wonder if all was as it appeared. At 7:10 she went online to check and see if he’d sent a: “Sorry, but I have to cancel” e-mail. He hadn’t.

At 7:15 she picked up the phone, called her good friend Linda and they went out for a beer. They sat around and made jokes (which were somewhat serious) about his mental status. Was he sitting there jerking off while imagining Jane at home in tears? Was he laughing at the fact that he thought he caused someone pain? Was he crying, slitting his wrists and yelling to himself “WHY CAN’T YOU JUST LOVE SOMEONE?” The girls quickly decided Jane had dodged a very dodgy bullet indeed!

In the end, Rob simply vanished into thin air. No explanation was given. He never again signed onto MSN, he deleted her from facebook, and their mutual friend never heard from him again.

Remember: Sometimes being an asshole is necessary. If you don’t want to go on the date YOU DON’T HAVE TO! Just pick up the phone and make a momentarily awkward call. If the person on the other end freaks out then you can be satisfied in knowing that while you’re an asshole they are in fact the psycho.