The Marine

I decided today what days next week I'm going to Tampa for an overnight business trip.  I texted a gentleman friend from that area and now I have a dinner date.  He needs a name - I think I will call him the Marine because he served twenty years in the Marines.  He's also a retired professional (I'm not going to say what profession), meaning that he has retired twice in his life..  I can already see Advizor doing the math, so yes Marine is quite a bit older than me.  The Marine is a little more than twice my age.

 

I met him through Ashley Madison.  Like many, I started an Ashley Madison account a long time ago.  Stop - don't be rushing over to try to find it.  My profile is down right now, it's down more often than it's up, and it may never be up again.  When I do make my account active, then my inbox is usually flooded w messages in just a few hours.  Seriously guys, do sending dick shots really work for you.  Once I delete all the dick shots, assholes, and whiners, I am generally left w just a few messages.  The Marine was more an accident than anything else.  His message made me smile (if you recall, I have said repeatedly this is the best way to get me separated from my pants) and I responded.  What I didn't notice was his age.  My fault entirely because he clearly stated it in his profile page.  He pointed it out again in a message, but by this time we were emailing and I didn't see any reason why age should matter w our just emailing.   His emails were funny and helped me through the days.  I also liked the way he could be sexually suggestive w/o being crude or disrespectful.  In a lot of ways, he reminded me of Harley.

 

We've met for dinner and drinks three times now over the past several months.  And it has been just dinner and drinks.  The first time, I didn't know what to expect.  We'd been emailing for several weeks.  Our emails are mostly friendly w just a flavor of flirting.  I told him I was coming to Tampa for a business trip.  He asked me to dinner, making it clear that he only meant dinner and was not coming onto me.  He also teased that if I came onto him, then he might not be able to fight me off.  He took me to Shula's.  Daddy would have been so jealous.  Daddy is a big Dolphins fan and idolizes Don Shula.  He's talked about going to Shula's whenever we're around one, but something always seems to get in the way.  Really, I'd be just as happy going to Denny's.  I'm more about who I'm with and The Marine is a great dinner companion.  I love listening to his stories.  Some are sad.  Some are funny.  He's had a long interesting life and he apparently loves to talk.  I like listening to him. 

 

And I'm talking about him why?  I don't know actually.  I find him interesting.  And we're going to dinner again next week.  And I never formally ruled out actually sleeping w him.  Its been something we've not discussed that much.  We've talked a lot about ourselves.  He's been open about the women he has seen.  I'm clearly the youngest.  I think he likes being seen w me; at least I hope he does!!  I like the companionship when I am in that area.  It makes a long dull trip something to look forward too.  Did I mention that he's 6'7".  I've told him a lot about me.  He knew about Tree.  We didn't meet for dinner during the brief window I thought things were possibly getting serious w Tree.  But we still talked.  He was sad to learn of my breaking up w Tree.  He's been like a mentor of sorts.