My hands smell like cinnamon cookies. I pilfered a pump’s worth of a coworker’s hand lotion (I really need to get some of my own).

So tonight I have another non-date with Gordon (I have a very western preoccupation with wanting to label my outings with him…Why is that?). I wanted to wait until next week when my money is going to be more fluid, but since he is set on seeing it this week, he proposed “spott[ing]” me. I want to see him more than I want to insist on paying for myself, so there you have it. He is the “value added” component.

I’m not opposed to letting him pay, if he wants to (or intends to) do that, but I do not like being a charity case. I have a hang up about this issue, in case you can’t tell. Because I really want to be in an actual dating relationship with him, him fronting me cash for joint activities just throws into sharper relief what the nature of our agreement is.

As I’m writing this I feel so stupid for focusing on this element of it. What is my problem? Isn’t it my objective to spend time with him?

See, this is how I get into trouble… I lug a preconceived notion of how something should look into a scenario with me, and then I miss it. I miss the delightful irony of my own story. How many of these non-dates have we had now?