The army soldier

Never underestimate the power of dressing appropriately for a date, and remember that accessories are key...

I love Montreal in December… everything is so white, pure and magical. However, it takes a certain grit to live in this part of the world… temperatures are freezing, snow falls by the foot; but that is no excuse to stay at home. So, you dress in multiple layers, you wear astronaut boots, and you cover your head, hands and face leaving only a little opening for your eyes to see.

No, I’m not intimidated by winters, and I continue my life as usual… Right now, I’m getting text messages every 10 minutes or so… it’s the army soldier. For some reason he likes text messaging, more so than talking on the phone. I don’t mind, but my cell is not particularly suited for text messaging, so the conversation is taking a long time, and there's a lot of guessing as well with the short texts.

He wants to set up a date, and I’m trying to accommodate his style the best I can. He wants us to meet at a bar in downtown Montreal, so no problem there. He tells me he’s on duty at the military base on that particular weekend, so he’d like to meet in the middle of the week if possible. “Yeah, sure I can do that,” I reply. He seems happy with how easy things are rolling, so he sends me another text message asking me if it’s good to talk over the phone. "Finally," I maunder, and so considerate of him… at least he won’t catch me in the shower washing my hair.

So, he phones me on my cell at the time he said he was calling. I’m quite impressed actually. He then starts talking about the different things going on in his life. He’s the officer on duty on that very day, and he had to go and sit in his car so he could have a little privacy while talking to me. We talked about the Canadian involvement in Afghanistan. I actually like this conversation; it shows me that he has a head on his shoulders. He mentions his dislike for bullies of any sort… “Wow,” I think, this is someone with a bit of a moral fiber; so yeah, he’s making an impression alright.

Then, the conversation takes an unexpected turn… He mentions that he has to get up at 400 hours on the next day because he has to take his troops on a half-an-hour run in the middle of winter. Ok, that’s brutal, but I guess it’s their job. He tells me that some of the recruits can’t stand the challenge, but that somehow, he makes them finish. Then, he says that he has to put them in the shower, and starts explaining a whole imagery of sizes, shapes and heights. I’m elated here… I’m actually getting inside information on the locker room shower without even asking! This is a lot of fun to listen to; and I don’t encourage nor discourage his descriptions.

He says he has to let me go soon… he needs to get some sleep, but he wants to set a date to go out, and I’m happy to comply with the day he proposed. He pauses for a moment, and asks me if he could make a request. “You can ask,” I say. He tells me that he would like me to wear a skirt. “Hmm,” I say, “it’s kind of cold outside,” and this is an understatement; but why not, I'm sort of feeling patriotic, so I agree. Now, this opens the door to a lot more strange questions: he asks me if I do French manicure on my nails; he also wants to know the colour of lipstick I use, and he mentions he likes glossy red; and he wants to know whether I’ll be wearing high-heels.

I’m a little thrown off-balance by now, and before he hangs up, he says something like “Oh, could you make that skirt very short please?” Ok, that made it and cracked a smile on my face, “sure,” I said in the most innocent tone I was capable of, and proceeded to the good byes. I think I need to get myself a dancing pole now...