I say most, however, because I spent a good portion of the summer between the second and third grade managing my collection of girlfriends; Robin, Debbie, Ann, and Cheryl. I could give you their last names, all of which I am certain would now be considered their maiden names, but in deference to their adult families, I demure.

So, second grade was a good year, potentially my best ever when it came to the ladies. It was certainly much better than the dating dry patch I hit in college — but that is not why we are here. I was into what I could have referred to as Shiite dating, dumping them before they could dump me. I was doing well enough in the dating department in high school that I could have been nicknamed the Dating Whisperer — I was good enough to have been drafted right from high school into dating’s NBA.

Maybe we should focus on what went wrong in my post-college dating life. I had it in my head that most girls I went out with thought differently than me, as in I did — think that is — and they did not. Try to keep up boys and girls.

For example, there was this one girl, a blind date I took to a party. At the party, we wound up playing Trivial Pursuit — not exactly a Mensa entrance exam but challenging enough for a lumberjack.

So, there we were, and my date gets the question “Name a reptile with four letters in its name.” Without thinking, I do not know if this was a genetic flaw or simply a misfiring synapse that caused her to holler “Spider!” At first, I thought she had seen a large arachnoid. And then it occurred to me that ‘spider’ was her answer to the Trivial Pursuit question.

She had the temerity to get mad at me because in front of everyone I announce that spiders are not reptiles. By the time I tried to tell her that ‘spider’ was spelled with six letters I was hyperventilating so badly that my best friend had to put a grocery bag over my head — I still wonder why he chose a plastic bag rather than a brown paper one. I was going to tell her reptiles had four legs and spiders had eight. Fortunately, my friend knew I would say that and so he cinched the bag tighter around my throat. Only when he saw my lips turning blue did he release the bag.

I knew there would never be a second date with her. Our future dating life was doomed if my desire to communicate with her involved discussing anything more meaningful than who Jennifer Aniston was dating.

It was soon afterward that I began my downward dating spiral, pulled into the emotional abyss guys refer to as the relationship black hole. So many women were shying away from a dating relationship with me that I considered making myself available to those who might be open to something part-time, or something involving flex-time.

Some girls wanted to just be friends, but I already had enough friends and none of those friends smelled pretty or wore makeup though that may not be the case today. I found myself getting concerned. who am I kidding, I was desperate. Since it had been a while since I had dated, I could not help but feel just the tiniest bit desperate — certain that if I did not get one soon (a date that is), that my dating clock would start moving counterclockwise and I would reclaim my dating virginity.

A first date is a lot like interviewing for a job except that I rarely knock back a vodka martini before a job interview. Job hunting is difficult enough without having to explain to the interviewer why I smell like vodka. For a first date, however, it’s di rigueur.

Some of my single girlfriends told me they were going through the same trials. One of them told me about one guy she was seeing who brought his cell phone to dinner and played games all night. She said that made it difficult to overlook that she was dating someone who lived in his parent’s basement and who was excited to get an Xbox 360 for Christmas. The good news, however, was that she could still take him to see Santa.

Maybe it is us, maybe it is me. Maybe I just was not cut out to be in a relationship with anything more meaningful than a universal remote control. I tried to reinvent myself, tried to be a manly man, you know, like a Viking — big, blonde, and reckless — but I could not figure out how to rid myself of my tendency to whine or cower in a corner like a frightened spider — see how this is all coming together with the spider being the circle of life.

My heart had been broken so many times that I even tried a little defensive dating, dating one person to keep me from falling in love with the person I really wanted to date who I knew would crush my soul. I even had one girl tell me she was dumping me and going for a dating upgrade, a gentleman-poet with nice Italian suits.

My relationship skills were in such a death spiral that my dating age was significantly less than my biological age. I think it’s possible a person can have a driver’s license age and a relationship age. Like if you go on a certain number of dates within a fixed period, it means you’ve aged a year in the dating world — the Shiite dating analogy.

Like this one girl I met online. We went for coffee. She told me online dating was all about the numbers. In probability theory, it is called the Law of Large Numbers which is a theorem that describes the result of performing the same experiment many times. She took on dating like she was an actuary, meeting guys for first dates several times a week.

For a few years, I became the go-to guy every time some girl who did not have a date got invited to a wedding. “Just ask Paul to go with you. I’m sure he’s not seeing anyone.” Now I should mention, the only reason I would agree to go to a wedding is if I had a chance to inspect the reception menu prior to accepting the invitation. My usual first thought about hearing someone was invited to a wedding was, glad it wasn’t me. My approach to attending a wedding other than my own has all the exuberance of someone contemplating painting the garage. Admit it. Even if you are good friends of the nuptualites, we’re usually talking serious tedium. This is especially true if you’re single and axiomatic if you’re single and dateless.

That was my love life, my love story. Unrequited. Until the retirement party for my second-grade teacher which all four of my second-grade girlfriends attended — this part of my musing is true. And there was little Ann, minus her Brownie uniform. Little Ann was no longer little. And I was smitten. It took me less than a minute to ask her out. After the party, we went to dinner and then went dancing. Afterward, sweet little Ann, Ann from the second grade, tried her best to seduce me.

What did I do? How did I respond to the advances of the girl who had owned my heart since the second grade? I did exactly what Wally Cleaver would have done were he to have found himself in the same situation — we can pause here while those of you who do not know Wally watch a few episodes of Leave it to Beaver on Netflix. I cupped Ann’s sweet face in my hands, looked her in the eyes, told her I was not that kind of guy, and I drove her straight home.

When I got home I called her. I called her until the buttons on my phone melted. Had she answered the phone I would have told her that I was that kind of guy, that I could be that kind of guy, that I would try really, really hard to be whatever kind of guy she needed me to be.

When all was said and done I was the same kind of a guy at the end of the evening that I was at the beginning of the evening — single.