Go for the gold

A man leans forward and bends over.\nWith eyes fixated on the ground below, he points his anus toward the sky, as if it were an African rain stick, hoisted to summon good harvest. Once positioned correctly, he picks up a small shovel and begins to dig in the dirt.\nAfter a few minutes, he abandons the shovel and starts to burrow manically with his hands. His fingers scoop and scrape wildly, clawing like cannibalistic vegans at a man made entirely of black beans.\nSuddenly, he stops. He’s found something. \nHe picks it up from the ground, scraping off the excess dirt. He looks excited – his smile is so wide it seems to loop around his face. However, the corners of his smile quickly take a dramatic plunge.\n“Son of a bitch!” he exclaims, chucking the object into the woods. “Fool’s gold!”\nWith that, he wipes his hands on his denim shorts, returns to his metal detector and continues to scavenge. \nAs I watch him from my apartment window, laughing to the point of occasional pee dribbles, I can’t help but wonder: What kind of person actually uses a metal detector? \nCome on, dude, bake some quiche. Knit yourself a life. Get a new hobby. \nHere’s this crazy guy who – in someone else’s yard – is bent over, showing off his ass like a Power Point presentation and actually searching for gold. \nYet as I watched him search, anxious to uncover hidden treasure, I finally realized: He’s not crazy, He’s just a hopeless romantic. \nLike the gold nugget, the “love nugget” seems to be a resource that’s difficult, if not impossible, to find. After a certain number of failed relationships, people begin loosing faith they’ll ever strike gold. At that point, they start accepting celibacy – eating Tater Tots by the handfuls and masturbating in the garage. \nHowever, what most saddened singles forget is, unlike gold, relationships are an entirely renewable resource. Finding them is merely a matter of tenacity. \nTake my story, for example. Every day last summer, when I returned from work, I would pass a nice-looking young gentleman walking his black lab near my house.\nFinally, one day, while feeling particularly zesty, I devised a plan for introduction. \nI would walk my dog toward him – wearing low-rise jeans that reveal my low-rise inhibitions – and when the dog leashes suddenly intertwined, so would our hearts. \nSurprisingly, the plan began unfolding just as I’d hoped. My pooch decided to drop a “doggy log” just as he passed, spurring on a lovely conversation about the gooeyness of canine feces. We then continued to walk and talk for several blocks. \nThough it turned out he was both heterosexual and married with children, the incident taught me a valuable lesson.\nEmbarrassment is inevitable, like sifting through layers of dirt. The more you face, the closer you get to discovering the good stuff. Whether you’re doing so bending forward, or bending over backward, you’ll find it eventually. The question is: Are you ready to dig?