This weekend while I was out with a friend, I was retelling some of my “best” first date stories. Some of them are doozies and some of them are pretty lame. But time after time my friend was in stitches because of the scenes that I unfolded about each of these dates. I don’t consider myself a serial dater, but I’ve gathered enough good stories over the years that she began encouraging me that I should blog some of them. So here we are – the first of “First Date,” what I’m tentatively planning to be a semi-regular addition to this little blog. (That is until I stop having first dates!)

To begin, the story that sparked it all: First Date #1 (not to be confused with my first date ever…stay tuned for that story)

It was a perfect summer evening in Washington (you know the kind – warm, sunny and with a light breeze) and I was excited to be heading out for a first date with a great guy I had met. The plan was to meet at the favorite local coffee house then set out on a walk through the neighborhood and get to know each other. It started out so well. He was there when I arrived, bought me an iced coffee, picked up one for himself and we hit the pavement.

We were enjoying the scenery. The beverages were cool. Conversation was going well, I guess. First dates are usually fairly easy as far as keeping a conversation going. You want to find out the basics – where does he work, how many siblings does he have, has he always lived in the area, what’s his favorite hobby, does he like animals? I rarely have a hard time making conversation or thinking of questions. (I’m a journalist. Heck, I took college courses about how to ask questions!) But this was a unique evening.

So there we were, walking around the pond in the park, casually drinking our coffees and chatting. It was quite obviously my turn to ask a question but my mind was blank. Empty. Nothing. I was at a complete loss and begin to panic. Then I panicked because I was panicking. All I could think of was, “Ask a question. Oh my gosh, ask a question!” Still nothing. Then I think, “Run! Just run!” And for the quarter of a second that I entertained the idea, I imagined myself, iced coffee in hand, flip flops on my feet, running away from my date. Really? Did I really just think that I could actually run away? And better yet, that by running away that would have made for a less awkward moment?

So there we were, walking in silence while I rapid-fire thought about running away from my date. It’s moments like this that I’m grateful that although it felt like 10 minutes in my head, it was really only 10 seconds in real time. I’m also grateful for my date who took pity on me and asked a question. Whew, crisis averted!