Speed Dating Events

No, we don’t mean the crazed, murderous, headline-making kind of stalking that’s all the rage these days. We mean a less violent type of safari in which your ex calls and hangs up as soon as you answer, or lurks around your apartment building to see if you’re coming home alone, or tries repeatedly to pick up the messages on your answering machine, or leaves you flowers or writes plaintive missives declaring his love. Ah, but that would be impossible, you say. Men never do such silly things, do they?

Mais oui.

Once considered the pink, frilly domain of girly-girls, crank calls to an ex-loved one seem to be enjoying increasing popularity among the male of the species. Surprised? We sure were. But facts is facts: Over one-third of the men we surveyed confessed to letting their fingers do the stalking. Their reasons were many: “I accidentally dialed her number” (we’re so sure), “I wanted to make sure she was okay, that she wasn’t too destroyed” (ego, much?), and “I was bored” (ever hear of MTV?) numbered among them. Some less lame explanations included “I wanted to talk to her, but then I lost my nerve,” “I wanted to see if she was out having a good time without me,” and “I wanted to hear her voice.” Okay, we’ll allow those—no stone-throwers, we.

Some of our men took that extra step and coerced friends or relatives into doing the dirty deed for them. “I used to ask my sister to call my ex at home on weekend nights, ask for a fake name, and then apologize and say she had dialed the wrong number,” said one thirty-year-old. “I would listen on another extension. After a couple of these, I got nervous that my sister’s voice would be recognized, so I made her wrap a dish towel around the receiver to distort the sound. It was a miserable, complicated little business.”

Others were not quite satisfied with the next best thing to being there. “I occasionally hung out at my old girlfriend’s house late at night,” said a thirty-one-year-old journalist. “I wanted to see if she was coming home with anyone. She had cheated on me with a friend of mine and I wanted to see if she was with him.” One enterprising fellow even followed his ex on a date. “They were going to a concert_; I put on a trench coat and sunglasses and walked behind them about half a block, ducking behind parked cars and trees. I don’t know what I was looking for. I guess I was kind of crazed.”

Somewhat less surreptitious were the guys who chose to do their haunting via FTD. “I left her a single red rose every day for a month,” said an ad salesman, thirty. “I thought it would charm her into loving me again, but now I see that it just made me look like a spineless ass.” A financial consultant admitted to writing shameless love letters, making gooey love-song tapes and leaving them with his ex’s doorman every week. A marketing exec who traveled frequently sent postcards from every city he went to. And a musician composed Desperately Seeking Susan-esque personals and had them printed in his local paper’s classified section.

Fortunately, these haunting expeditions rarely lasted too long. Even the most lovelorn guy eventually sees the absurdity in moonlighting as Inspector Clouseau or serenading a twelfth-story window. “I had to make one last-ditch effort to win her back,” said one of our surveyed men. “It was more something I had to do for myself than for her. I didn’t want to feel like I hadn’t given it my best shot. Once I had, I could move on.”

And so shall we move on, to the last leg of our little journey . . .

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