Joyce and I met the old-fashioned way: online. For the vast majority of people who use this now conventional dating method, romantic life can be an endless series of swipe-lefts, get-to-know-you DMs and occasional, interminable, 20-minute coffee dates.
The site, Chemistry.com, was designed to create blind matches, with one side of the pair not knowing to whom their profile was being sent. Joyce got mine and liked it a lot, but there was a catch: I was the “keeper of two fury felines.”
Joyce was allergic to felines. Still, my profile spoke to her, and she reached out anyway. I really liked her profile as well but asked whether she’d actually read mine (hers clearly stating that due to a cat allergy, cat owners need not apply). She said it wouldn’t be a problem — secretly thinking that perhaps, if everything worked out, she could change my mind about cats.
We had a longer-than-usual online on-ramp, so when we agreed to meet in person, we took a gamble and skipped the coffee house for a drink at Silver Lake’s once great treasure, Cobras & Matadors. Refreshingly, our first face-to-face drifted from a drink to a dinner that became a multi-hour delight. There was a clear connection (and she sure looked good in that pair of jeans and boots).
Transplants to L.A., Joyce was from the Midwest, then the South, and I’m a New Englander/New Yorker. She was a theatrical costume designer, just beginning an effort to get into film and TV (she would go on to win an Emmy). I was a leadman (set decoration supervisor) in film and TV. Given our similar but different worlds, it was unlikely we would have met in the business.
The first date went so well that a second was a no-brainer. That one lasted even longer and ended happily with an old-fashioned kiss — it was electric. Date 3 … was fire. Literally. (Be patient.)
Movie-making sounds glamorous, but it can be a dirty slog for the crew. My latest film had me working all day inside a Sony soundstage in Culver City, re-creating the bowels of a Parisian sewer. I was filthy and tired but looking forward to seeing Joyce. After so many misfires with others, we were feeling the spark.
Spark? Perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself. Anyway, rather than my commute home to Studio City before meeting up, we agreed that I should shower and change at her place in Silver Lake. She would whip up some dinner. It would be easy, simple.
Despite my filthy state, she greeted me warmly, planting a welcome peck on my lips. A spare towel and a push toward the shower got the engine running. To further set the mood, she lit candles throughout the apartment. While I cleaned up, she continued in the kitchen, lovely smells filling the air.
When we first connected, I was vacationing in Maine, and she was working out of town at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. The distance gave us time to get acquainted without the diversion of physical proximity. By the time we met in person and had a couple of dates, we’d become familiar enough that taking a shower at her place was less daring than it might seem. Still, the act lent an air of excitement that neither of us would deny. It felt almost natural to step out of her bathroom with only a towel around my waist.
When I opened the door, I assumed the flickering light in her bedroom was caused by the billowing steam. Imagine my surprise when, instead, I saw her wicker dresser fully engulfed in flame, the fire licking up the wall. Somehow, one of the candles had set the thing off. I yelled for Joyce to grab a fire extinguisher and ripped off my towel to smother the blaze.
Joyce rushed into the room, apron showing off her hard work in the kitchen. Her face registered appropriate alarm. I remain unsure if it was the flames or me, the naked man, trying to put them out. I suppose both. Regaining her wits, she ran to the kitchen and grabbed a small fire extinguisher. In a panic, Joyce’s brain can lock up. Forgetting how the extinguisher worked, she handed it to me. I yanked the pin and doused her flaming underwear drawers with a heavy dose of CO2.
The mood then understandably shifted. A few years prior, while living in that same apartment, Joyce nearly lost her home when the building next door burned down. The heat caused damage to this very bedroom, and among other things, ruined the drapes; now the new ones captured smoke as we opened the windows to let it out. Her burned bureau and the black soot staining the wall reignited her past trauma. Although our desire to hang out remained, the home-cooked meal was suddenly not in the cards.
After ensuring the fire was well and truly out, we decided that a restaurant pampering was in order. Mexican sounded nice, a margarita even more. El Conquistador was calling to us. Coming out of our shock, we alternated between laughter — me acting the hero, pillado desnudo (“caught naked”) — to renewed shock as Joyce tried to come to terms with yet another fire. An eavesdropping party took pity on us and sent over some shots. That took the edge off.
Although our date had veered dramatically, I saw in Joyce a resilience that I admired. We share many attributes, among them: optimism, adaptability and the capacity to laugh at life’s foibles. A little more than a year later, standing on the Hawaiian volcano, Haleakala, we got engaged at sunrise. Six months of mad planning later, we were wed at Rancho del Cielo, a fabulous old ranch set on a Malibu hilltop. It would later be taken by wildfire, but owners continue their effort to rebuild it.
Joyce and I are blessed with wonderful boy/girl twins. And we have two cats (her allergies abated). I’ve repeatedly talked her out of a third, both kids and cats.
To this day, we work well under pressure. During the wildfires earlier this year, we were unexpectedly evacuated. The mountainside outside our window was fully engulfed, and the town next door was an inferno. Oddly, our funny but frightening fire date didn’t come back to haunt us. Perhaps because the event provided a lesson and an instinct: Be prepared, act fast and take comfort in knowing that we have each other’s backs.
The author is a former set dresser for film and TV and is now a science fiction novelist. He lives in La Cañada Flintridge. Visit his website at cchaseharwood.com or find him on Instagram: @c_chase_h.
L.A. Affairs chronicles the search for romantic love in all its glorious expressions in the L.A. area, and we want to hear your true story. We pay $400 for a published essay. Email [email protected]. You can find submission guidelines here. You can find past columns here.
The post L.A. Affairs: So there I was, naked, on our third date, trying to douse a bedroom fire appeared first on Los Angeles Times.
