In city or country, dating frustrations are universal

Maine and New York City couldn’t be farther apart, right?

You’re thinking, “Mainers are courteous, relaxed and generally happy to be living in the quiet of a more rural place. New Yorkers are impolite, rushed and grouchy because they’re cooped up in the city.” Stereotypes to be sure, but each with a grain of truth.

But during a recent conversation with the BDN’s venerable ShopGirl, we debated a theory she had about one of the differences she had noticed between Mainers and city folk.

Mainers are more reluctant to approach strangers and just talk, she hypothesized, than city people. That made me recall experiences flying solo in bars or restaurants both here and in the city.

The last time I was in a bar by myself in Maine, I had a conversation with the bartender about my club soda being on the house. There were plenty of people in the restaurant but it was only as I was leaving, when I ran into a friend, that I had someone to talk to.

Yet during a trip to NYC a few years ago I wandered into a bar full of Pittsburgh Steelers fans on Sunday afternoon. The guys quickly gave me the nickname “Bangor” and took me under their wing until the game ended.

It sounded like a theory – are New Yorkers actually more outgoing and friendly than Mainers? – I was made to test.

And I had a perfect way to do it, too. I had planned to spend a few days after Thanksgiving in New York City. It just so happened that I was to stay in an Upper East Side neighborhood I knew to be filled with young singles.

My only rule for the evening was not to talk to anyone without being prompted.

I picked a Monday night with a football game between the struggling Green Bay Packers and the surging Seattle Seahawks on TV – perfect for bringing out the guys, right? After a consultation with a city friend who is familiar with the area, I set off walking uptown on Third Avenue at about 9:15 p.m.

Oh, here’s another big difference between Maine and New York – in the city things get started later and bars stay open longer.

My solo odyssey began at the Back Page, a sports-themed bar near 83rd Street. I sidled up to the bar and ordered an Amstel Light. Here’s another of those city-country differences: the bottle of beer was $6.

I was surprised to find the bar relatively vacant, with two guys sitting together at one end, another two sitting in the middle and one at the other end. In between there were plenty of empty seats, so I chose one near the men in the middle.

It was a wise choice for the moment, as the guys were having an animated conversation about the time one of them was in love with a woman but couldn’t marry her because she was Jewish and he was Catholic. They knew I was close enough to listen in, which I did.

I must have given them a knowing smile – the Jewish-Catholic thing is something I’m familiar with – and as the loser-in-love left he patted me on the back and said, “Good night, sweetheart.” The other fellow finished his drink a few minutes later, said good night and left, too.

There were still two men at the far end of the bar, but I got no conversation bites. A few minutes later, with the first half of the game coming to an end, I decided to move on.

Next up was the Mad River Bar and Grille, where any outdoors-loving Mainer would feel at home. There were canoes used as decor, a painted illustration of different fly-fishing flies, and much cheaper beer.

I picked a seat at the bar next to a man who was drinking coffee and watching the football game alone. He never said a word to me, maybe because he was too busy muttering to himself about the Packers, who were falling behind the Seahawks.

As the third quarter of the game wrapped up and the losing team continued to fall behind, therefore increasing the man’s mutterings, I decided to try a third bar with yet another theme. I settled on McKeown’s, an Irish pub a few blocks down from Mad River. The corner seat was empty, so I took it, this time ordering a club soda.

Bar three, strike three. The bartender, an attractive guy with an even more attractive accent, talked to me long enough to get my drink order. After about 30 minutes of listening to a man in a business suit try to pick up a blonde next to me, and as the Seahawks had the Packers on the ropes, I decided it was time to end my experiment. I trudged back down Third Avenue to my bed.

In the final analysis, I can’t point to what happened to ShopGirl’s theory (notice I give her all the blame now that the theory was disproved). Maybe the football game was too distracting, although neither team came from anywhere close to New York. Maybe it was me, dressed way down in jeans and sneakers after a long day of walking in the city. Or maybe it was an awkward time to visit a bar, late on a work night.

A few days later I returned to McKeown’s, this time with a friend from Bangor who is living in the city, and his girlfriend.

This time, the point of the evening was to catch up with my friend and meet his girl. Sure enough, when I turned around to trade my rickety barstool for a steadier one, another bar patron standing nearby informed me he wanted to introduce a friend with whom he was standing. Caught off guard, I stammered something about being busy talking to my own pals.

Now I was really confused. A woman with enough guts to wander alone in a bar and order a couple of beers during a football game wasn’t good enough, but a distracted woman on a wobbly chair was?

At least this was reinforced during my three-bar solo adventure: City or country, alone or in a group, frustrations with relationships – and the Green Bay Packers – are universal.

Jessica Bloch can be reached at jbloch@bangordailynews.net