Big Small Town

Nashville is an extraordinary place. On paper, it looks like a mid-sized American city. Hustle, bustle, freeways, suburbs, pollution, scandals... all the trappings of a large city. Don't you agree? But you have been fooled! Bamboozled, I tell ya! Nashville is no bigger than Mayberry.

Just yesterday, I was at Target. I rolled out of bed, popped on a ball-cap, and swished some Listerine and drove my happy ass over to the discount mecca to purchase some shampoo that I kept forgetting to buy. I had zits all over my face and I was in the stupidest outfit of ill-fitting yoga pants, a ratty sweatshirt, and Chuck Taylors. To my horror, I ran into five, count 'em FIVE of my regulars at the bar.

And this is not just a freak occurrence... I run into people I know EVERYWHERE! I drive next to them on the freeways, I see them in the waiting room at my gyno, they're at the movie store, the bank, even behind me in line at Kroger as I'm trying to discreetly buy condoms. One day a few months ago, I was at the mall and a woman stopped me to ask me where I bought the dress I was wearing. "Go to Target, but hurry, there were only a few, blah blah blah." Later that night, I was coming out of the bathroom at a downtown bar and the woman on her way in freaked out. "OH MY GOD! YOU'RE THE GIRL FROM THE MALL! I WENT TO TARGET BUT THEY WERE OUT! OH MY GOD!" Needless to say, I was a little overwhelmed.

I come from a Large Midwestern City and this NEVER happened there. I could live in comfortable anonymity, going about my life only finding people when I want to find people. I would never dream of driving behind my best friend randomly on the freeway in Large Midwestern City. But that has happened in Nashville several times.

And I shudder to think what this means to my dating life. Too few men for me? Am I going through the cache of available men too quickly? This Mayberry-ness has already reared its head in a couple of ugly ways...

So I've been known to "juggle" men... you know, date several at one time. My friends (and mom) have joked about the horror if all my boytoys ran into each other at the bar. Haha... funny. It's a good joke until it actually happened.

I was working one Sunday with Momma when I had gotten a text from Gibson that he was in town and was going to stop in and see me. Ten minutes later, DB walked in. (This is back at the height of when all the girls thought he and I were dating). Finally, Rover came in to have a beer. And they were all sitting a seat away from each other. Welcome to hell. Especially because none of them quite knew about the other one. To top it all off, Stavros walked in. Stavros was my college sweetheart--boyfriend of four years who moved down here with me. We broke up last year, but remain friends.

Momma just looked at me and laughed. Giggled, actually. With glee. She was taking way too much joy in this situation.

This town is too small, I tell ya. Don't people drink at any other bars??

Another time this summer, Gibson was in town and I decided to take him to a Sounds game on Thirsty Thursday ($1 drafts!). If you don't know, The Sounds are our minor league baseball team. Going to Sounds games is so fun, cause it's like little league with beer. Gibson and I had been seeing each other for several months by now, but most of our dates consisted of dinner somewhere nice then back to his hotel or my apartment for a sleepover. There were very little public outings... hey! He was only in town for a very short amount of time... I really wanted to maximize our activities :)

So anyway, we're at the Sounds and it was mayhem. Everywhere we turned, someone stopped me to say "hey." Even the people sitting behind us were long lost friends of mine from a bygone era. Which meant I had to introduce him to every person we came across which was hell cause I was having a hard time remembering everyones names. Gibson and I couldn't even have a conversation because we had to stop every few minutes to chat with someone else. He got a little overwhelmed, turned to me and said, "Do you know EVERYONE in Nashville?!"

"No, just the drunks," I said. "There are a lot of them."

I think it's time to move to another town where there are no men I've dated and nobody knows me. But sometimes it is fun feeling like a celebrity... :)