Dating Mr Vain

When I was in Standard 9 (Grade 11), I was a drummie. I was also dating a guy, whose best friend was Mr Vain. Even though this guy and I broke up, Mr Vain stuck around on the periphery, stopping in to say hi to us girls once in a while. We also share the same birthday, though he’s older, so I would get an annual phone call as well.

 

Anyway, while he was hanging around the drummies, he used to wear cycling shorts – not the long ones, the mid-thigh length ones, and in white. Yes… white. Very Axl Rose! We were also convinced that he stuffed said cycle shorts, my mother included. I have photos of us girls ripping him off by stuffing T-shirts in our pants while doing spring holiday training.

At about the same time, the song Mr Vain by Culture Beat came out and what do you know, we had the perfect poster boy for it! If anyone loved himself and spent hours on his appearance, it was him!

He once entered Mr South Africa. He asked everyone he knew to vote for him. He won the best body section but sadly came last (12 out of 12) in the personality section.

Time moved on and the one day I bumped into him at the gym. He was looking hot. He’d been training hard, tanning, highlighting his hair and had had his teeth fixed. I must admit it was the body that sold me. So we started chatting again. While catching up, I discovered that he was a stripper/male pageant entrant, though he called himself a ‘dancer/model’. His stage name was Tristan Pitt. Yes, Tristan as in Brad Pitt’s character in Legends of the Fall and well, Pitt is pretty obvious. It turns out that depending on who was hot at the time he would try and copy their look… Enrique Iglesias, Ricky Martin, Brad Pitt and so on.  

We then ended up dating for a while. I have to say I was SO curious about whether his pants were actually stuffed or if we were just being bitches. We did the normal dating stuff, around the occasional stripper tour, sorry, ‘dancing tour’. They really toured a lot to fancy places like East London, PE and Bloemfontein… ahhhh, how he loved the life of an ‘entertainer’.

Anyway, one night he invited me over to his place for dinner and a sleep over. My mother was almost as excited as me to find out what was really in his pants! We’re close like that. So off I went, all ready to go. He cooked and burnt Woolworths lasagne. We watched a movie, had a couple drinks and then, it was time!! Just before it came to crunch time and the inevitable pants removal, he sat up and said, “Sorry I can’t do this, I have heartburn.” WTF?? Really? Apparently not even a Rennies could cure it. So that was that, I turned over and went to sleep.

A couple weeks later, all communication suddenly stopped. And when I say stopped it was like he had joined the Amish and disappeared forever. He changed gyms, didn’t answers smses, emails, calls. I thought maybe he had been attacked and kidnapped by a crazed fan (well I hoped so!). So I gave up on that and carried on with things.

At that stage of the social scene, Ladies Night at Bourbon Street on Thursday nights was HUGE! We went every Thursday, drank for free and laughed at the male strippers. I had never seen “Tristan” dance and it really was inevitable that we would cross paths again. Lo and behold, one night we were graced with the dance moves of the Cowboys and Angels, led by Tristan Pitt (backed up by his younger brother – their mother must be so proud!). they danced, we laughed… he took all his kit off, but held a vest or something in front of his (still mysterious) junk. I felt quite nauseous – quite a reality check that! Aaaaand, OVER IT!

A few weeks after that, I bumped into him at gym again. Apparently he disappeared because he didn’t know how to tell me that his dad wanted him to move to Malaysia to run their business there. Really?!? Apparently there were no balls included in that alleged package.

Since then, he still hasn’t won any personality competitions, he’s tried to break into the singing market, both English and Afrikaans and didn’t make it – who can’t make it as an Afrikaans singer?!? I once heard him sing at a fundraising charity fete. I was quite hungover and was suddenly subjected to someone trying to hit Justin Timberlake’s super high notes. It was horrifying! It was Mr Vain. Singing on a stage with no audience. Kinda sad really… My BFF also once bought me his CD for my birthday (she happened to be in the same beauty salon as him). We listened to it at the party and ended up crying with laughter, it was that bad! He now does Verimark and Homemark exercise adverts. Even sadder…

So that is the story of when I once (and only once) dated a stripper. Sorry, I mean ‘dancer’…

Standing still in the swirl

Do you ever feel like you’re standing still and the world is moving around you? Not as in the world revolves around you… the way I picture it is like in the movies. You know, the scene (usually at a very important life point) where the person is standing, usually in a busy street, and people are swirling around them. That’s how I feel sometimes…

The reason for this at the moment is that in the last couple months, all these people I know (all of them younger than me) are moving in with their partners, getting engaged, getting married, taking huge steps towards a future with someone they intend to spend the rest of their lives with. This has lead me to think about whether this means I have been left behind?

In my 20’s I had so much fun – going out all the time to clubs, dating all sorts of guys. I had my guy friends that I used to go out with (who are all married with kids now). It was a time of learning for me – finding out what I was and wasn’t looking for in this (elusive) long term ‘perfect’ match. I also developed some great street smarts and have some awesome stories to tell about what I got up to. On the downside, this may also be where my cynicism started to develop…

Is there some unspoken rule or timeline that I missed? Was I supposed to have at least one long relationship of a year or two under my belt by the time I turned 30? When I get asked the dreaded question “How long was your longest relationship?” and my answer is (now) “less than a year” (which is technically the truth). Judging by the look of shock and horror that I get in response leads me to believe that this is true.

Why is it that I should’ve met this target? Why waste a year or two with someone I don’t intend on spending much more time with, let alone the rest of my life? Doesn’t it count that I’ve met other more ambitious milestones, like buying my own house and having 2 (and a half) degrees? And while I was doing all of that, I was still having tons of fun and finding a serious boyfriend didn’t feature as much – though I did look, but never really found what I was looking for.

But now back to standing still in a swirl of movement. So, all these people are meeting people and making these big commitments. Is there a trick to it or is it luck? Do they have to work really hard at finding it and then keeping it? Is it just their time in the grander scheme of things according to the universe? Were they just listening and paying attention? Did this all happen while I had a lapse in concentration? All very possible… I am easily distracted… 

Oooh! Those are pretty shoes!

Sorry… Like I said , I get side-tracked easily.

When I’m feeling like that, maybe the trick is to go with the flow and just jump into the swirl and get caught up in it and believe that I will randomly bump into the best person for me when I least expect it? It actually doesn’t sound that bad! I think I’ll be on the next wave off this island.