Left in Love is a dating column for progressive daters who give a damn! Each month, Meghan Murphy matches couples looking for radical love and documents the date in this space. Our couple this month is Selina and Cass.
Selina is 29-year-old who works in the arts. She loves documentaries that aren’t really documentaries, karaoke and friendship. Short/idealist.
Cass is a weirdo who lives on Commercial Drive and works managing festivals, concerts and political campaigns. He enjoys a good cappuccino and is in a casual relationship with local gin. Jaded/pragmatic.
Selina: I really like meeting new people and was looking forward to the novelty of going on a blind date. After participating (and losing) in a dating game show in front of a live audience earlier this year, I thought to myself, “there’s no way this could possibly be more embarrassing.”
Cass: I’d never been on a blind date before so I was pretty nervous. I stopped at the Black Frog for a shot and a drink before heading to Nuba in order to cool my sweating heart.
Selina: Cass greeted me with a big hug which was nice and set a very comfortable tone for the rest of the evening. He immediately struck me as friendly and warm, and was chatting away with the folks sitting at the table next to us which made me think he might be from the Prairies or something…. It later came up that he, in fact, knew our table neighbours from his time LIVING IN MANITOBA (ha!). Also I really liked his shirt.
Cass: Selina had cool glasses and was a bicyclist so seemed pretty chill. The conversation was super smooth, though it began with us each stating that we support different civic political organizations… There were tons of similarities in our lives; we’d worked at similar organizations just years apart and had even interviewed for the same job at one point.
Selina: Despite the fact that our political allegiances differ (he works with Vision Vancouver, and I’m a member of COPE [Coalition of Progressive Electors] and very excited about the work that the Left Front is doing), it turned out that we have a lot in common. We’re both vegetarians and have both worked for festivals and non-profits — I actually worked a small contract last year for a non-profit youth organization that he founded a number of years back. We know a lot of the same people and joked, at one point, that we were just gossiping the whole time. We talked about growing up in a small town (he’s from rural Nova Scotia and I’m from Manitoba) and I was impressed that he has actually visited my birthplace, The Pas, Manitoba.
Cass: Selina seemed even busier than me. She works for VIFF (Vancouver International Film Festival) and DOXA (a documentary film festival in Vancouver) and just produced the Shout Back Festival. In what must be her spare time she plays in a couple of bands, including a garage pop band called Super Moon that is playing at the Victory Square Block Party which everyone should join me in checking out.
Selina: Cass splits his time between festival logistics and political organizing. He’s lived in almost all major cities across Canada and has been involved in all sorts of activism — from the Quebec City student movement to WTO protests in Seattle. His tale of being a one-man bathroom bandit during his university days was hilarious. (Apparently he was the founder of the “bathroom liberation front” which at one point rid the entire campus of bathroom ads.) He was attentive, thoughtful and down-to-earth.
Cass: Selina and I fell into a really comfortable conversation right away, which I liked, and we know so many of the same people, but it also ended up feeling like more of a friend/conspirer vibe than a romantic one…
Selina: I told Cass about a top-secret project I have in the works and he was very enthusiastic and gave some great feedback, which left me feeling really inspired. I really appreciated how he struck a balance between being open and friendly, yet critical and self-reflexive. Cass has a good sense of humor and even laughed at a couple of my jokes! The date was a lot more fun than I’d expected. I felt like we’d been living parallel lives.
Cass: It was great to meet someone so passionate about making the city a better place; I really hope we get to work together in the future. At the end of the date we hugged and made plans to stay in touch.
Selina: After dinner we had another drink and chatted a bit more in the restaurant. I was tired after a full day of work, and he had plans to meet up with a friend so we hugged goodbye. Because of the nature of the situation (meeting a stranger for the first time), the date felt more friendly than romantic… Before parting ways we joked about how we both had big exciting plans of going home and catching up on laundry. We didn’t make specific plans to hang out again, but I think it’d be fun to keep in touch.
Cass: I think we’ll hang out again.
Cass rated the date 7/10
Selina rated the date 8/10 (though she felt the rating system was very arbitrary)
Tired of wading through profiles on online dating sites? Apathetic offerings getting you down? Left in Love is rabble.ca’s answer to dating fatigue. And where better to find your match than among fellow progressives! Who wants to waste a night out with someone who thinks heath care is bad for the economy or who suggests things like “pulling oneself up one’s bootstraps?” Let us send you out on the town with someone who will tickle your radical fancy! If you’re in the Vancouver area and would like to take part, contact us at love[at]rabble.ca and fill out an application.
Meghan Murphy is a writer and a journalist in Vancouver, B.C. The column Left in Love is published every month.
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