Rom-Com

I often look at my love life as if it were a romantic comedy. Girl meets boy, the course of true love doesn’t run smooth, and the heroine and hero must go through much travail before love conquers in the end.

Right now, I’m in the part of the romantic comedy that shows our heroine in a montage of mediocre dates.

When the Marine Turned Business Guy asked me to meet him for drinks at the Four Seasons, I thought things were looking up. I could (almost) overlook the fact that he took his Macallan on the rocks, but I couldn’t ignore the distinct feeling that if I didn’t ask he wouldn’t tell.

Sensitive Social Worker was a wine connoisseur and I dug his taste in tapas. But he was a bit of a lightweight for an oenophile and quite possibly the worst kisser since, well, ever. When he kissed me on the corner of 78^th Street and 2^nd Avenue, I’d wobbled a bit. He thought it was because the kiss was so potent. I was actually trying to squirm away from the tight, hard lips and darting, lizard-like tongue. The boy who kissed me on the school playground after my eighth grade graduation had more game, quite frankly.

Too Cute was, obviously, way too cookie cutter cute and quite a player at that. Indie Rock Star I was not very sophisticated and kind of a cold fish. And Indie Rock Star II had exclaimed, “I’m a raging heterosexual” one too many times. Well, he said it once and that was really enough for me to think it untrue. (What is it, by the way, with so many 40-something NYC men and the closet? You can come out now. It’s really nice out here.)

Then last week, after leaving a tasting event at Sons of Essex on the Lower East Side with a PSM (he added a few drops of water to an otherwise neat Balvenie Single Barrel 25-Year Old – respect), I noticed that I’d received a text. I was surprised, as much as I can be with my ghosts of boyfriends past track record, to find that it was from Jack.

Hopping in a taxi, I wondered if this was a testing of the waters. I did know this: according to the rules of romantic comedy, it takes a lot more than a text message to get the girl.

Scotch Snapshot

Saturday night, as Hurricane Irene raged outside, I cozied up with a bottle of Ledaig.

Summer Whiskey Pick: Rye

The dog days of summer are not prime Scotch drinking weather, I’ll admit. So when it’s too hot for Scotch, why not try rye?

If Scotch is Sean Connery in Dr. No, then rye is James Dean in Giant. Distilled from at least 51 percent rye, American rye whiskey has traditionally been Scotch’s working-class American cousin. It’s been the workingman’s whiskey, the shot that grandpa and his pals took with their beers at the neighborhood bar after a long day at the factory.

But in Manhattan today, rye is no longer your granddad’s whiskey. It’s been making a comeback as of late in cocktails in fine eateries and watering holes all over the city. It’s in the Plum Cobbler at Perilla Restaurant (using Old Overholt Straight Rye; 9 Jones Street, NYC) and the 17th Street Sazerac at Rye House (using Whistlepig Straight Rye; 11 West 17th Street, NYC), and straight up at the Brandy Library (25 North Moore Street, NYC).

I love a good old American comeback story, don’t you?

Next! Two

Instead of jetting off to Italia for pasta, vino and cultura a la Julia Roberts, I opted for two weeks of gallo pinto, cerveza and naturaleza. I said adios los Estados Unidos de America and hola Costa Rica.

I’m not usually a tour taker, but with my sudden need to get away due to my recent split, I booked an adventure tour and hoped for the best. Arriving in San Jose, I met up with the group. A bevy of single travelers, we were: beautiful, blonde and serene Ella from London; sassy, sophisticated, Scotch-drinker Jessica, also from London; From Belgium, leggy, outdoorsy, boy crazy in the best possible way Celine; cute, feisty and daring Polish Ana; and tall, quiet and unassuming Englishman Jerry.

Our first stop was the town of La Fortuna. After a long hike in the national park, we paused at dusk to observe Volcan Arenal and down some Cacique Guaro, the national liquor of Costa Rica, before hitting the Baldi Hot Springs. In the otherwise quiet and dark night, Baldi was pulsating with sound and light. Locals and tourists mingled, sipping pina coladas in pools illuminated with soft green, blue and golden lights as salsa y merengue music blasted into the tropical night.

Slipping away from the group and into one of the quieter, more isolated pools, I lay down on a tiled chaise lounge half submerged in the hot spring water and half in the cool night air. The sound of a waterfall drowning out the distant music, I stared up into the sky, clear and heaving with stars. I felt all the miles of distance stretching out between me and New York City, me and Jack. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath and began to let the door close on him.

It wasn’t long before I learned that everyone in our group had been nursing a broken heart of sorts. In Tortuguero, an isolated stretch of land between a canal and the Caribbean accessible only by small boat or plane, we stayed at the rustic All Rankin’s Lodge. Spending the hours from late afternoon to well past sunset in hammocks by the canal sipping Imperial beer, we moved past polite surface conversation, delving into the deep and meaty bits of our lives. By our second day in this remote spot, we began discussing our relationship statuses at home and why we’d all taken this trip. I started with my Jack story.

As I ended my tale, Jessica piped up, “That’s exactly what just happened to me!” Followed by Celine, “Me too!” and then Ana. We’d each encountered an extremely similar break up in recent months, with the same reasons for the split and the same timeline. For Ella and Jerry, some very tough relationship endings were in the not too distant past as well.

It’s amazing how two weeks of spending time with simpatico souls, falling asleep to the symphonies of frogs outside your bedroom window, looking into the inquisitive faces of baby sloths, and feeling the warm sand in your toes as you stroll to Pacific beaches with gangs of capuchin monkeys hot on your trail can restore your mind and feed your heart.

On my last day of vacation, lounging in a pool in Cahuita, I made a resolution. The sentimental journey must come to an end. No more strolls down memory lane. No more repeat offenders. I must exorcise my haunted relationship house of all boyfriends bygone. These forays into my love past appeared oh so romantic but these past loves turned out to be nothing more than transparent, fleeting ghosts.

So a new journey begins. Striding down East 57^th Street last week, I was literally moving forward, my brand new Anthropologie dress fluttering out behind me. I opened the heavy wooden door, stepping from out of the sun and heat into the dark and cool bar. My new strappy high heels click-clacked on the floor announcing my entrance. He turned around.

Next! One

If journeys end in lovers meeting, then journeys begin in lovers parting.

I just began a new journey.

When last we left off, I’d determined to exit my poetry and Scotch cocoon. My Burns Night resolution in full effect, I’d spent several weeks dating incessantly. Son of the Black Panther, Cocky Lawyer Dad, German Personal Trainer…Then, just as I was about to retreat back into my world of Rabbie and Ledaig, the ghost of boyfriends past followed me into the present. Again.

Like Casper the Friendly Ghost but with a strong jaw line, wide shoulders and sex appeal, Jack had fit the bill of PSM (Potential Scotch Man) when last we met. Unfortunately at that time, I was fresh off my break-up with Half Baked, my live-in boyfriend of three years, named so for his affection for the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream flavor, not weed. When I bumped into Jack at Shoolbred’s sipping Lagavulin in front of the fireplace, I was surprised to see this love specter in one of my favorite watering holes and thrilled to learn that he fit the PSM bill now more than ever.

Quite a romantic courtship ensued. Nights at the opera and Scotch, dinner at Picholine and Scotch, slow dancing at home to Nina Simone and Scotch. And then it happened one night a few weeks ago. Another theme that has haunted my love life past popped up in the present with a “boo!” Jack, voice nervous, began with “I’m falling in love." The chaotic jumble of words that followed ended with “I’m scared. I’m not ready.”

Here it was, once again, the “I’m scared” lament. This is a possible relationship, not Scream. Is the prospect of love, the real thing, that frightening? Is it terrifying enough to send a man running from a woman as if from Jason at Camp Crystal Lake?

I wasn’t afraid of love, but I did my own brand of running. In the spirit of Eat, Pray, Love, I decided to take a trip.

My Heart Belongs to Rabbie

Born too late. That’s me. Always with the love affairs with the dead poets.

Last night, I celebrated my latest literary crush, Scottish poet Robert Burns. With his dark, dashing good looks and his workingman’s poet persona, Rabbie is a bona fide sex symbol as far as I’m concerned. So he was a bit of a scoundrel with the ladies, but that just lends to his legend. And, anyway, what great romantic poet wasn't? (Keats, I suppose.)

January twenty-fifth marks the bard’s birthday – yesterday he celebrated his 252^nd – an event commemorated by Scots with Burns Night suppers featuring haggis, Scotch and poetry. I honored his birthday with a quiet evening in the cozy comfort of home. Fancying myself his Clarinda, I read Ae Fond Kiss and let the gentle smoky sting of Ledaig single malt kiss my lips.

“Had we never loved sae blindly,

Never met—or never parted,

We had ne'er been broken-hearted.”

As I read his words, I realized that I’ve been hiding from the living men dating pool since New Year's Eve. Come sleet, snow or dark of winter night, I needed to get back in there. Rabbie would want me to.

Highland Toddy

Deep in the January doldrums, I met my friend Remy last night at Highlands, a Scottish gastropub in the West Village. Their Highland Toddy, made with Famous Grouse, maple bitters, brown sugar, Compass Box Orangerie and clove, and the thick fluffy snowflakes that began to fall outside, got me back into the winter spirit.