Philadelphia Sex Diaries: I Am a Reformed Hookup King
“I lost count. Maybe 20?”
I was standing in Transit, the long-departed Spring Garden Street nightclub, talking to a woman I ended up going home with that night. It was late. We were drinking. I can’t remember who asked first, but I ended up telling her I couldn’t remember how many people I’d slept with.
We dated for two years, but after we broke up, my unknown number ballooned. Not bad for a guy who didn’t have his first kiss until age 15 (in a movie theater, during Godzilla). Perhaps in a subconscious effort to make up for lost time, I tore through Philadelphia in my 20s. I had a few short-lived relationships. But mainly, I just hooked up with people.
I went on more than 100 dates over a two-year period, but I was never able to nail the door shut on a long relationship. I often did the reverse, ghosting on women who liked me more than I liked them. I didn’t plan on getting laid as often as possible, but it ended up that way.
My sex life took on a mind of its own: Post-coitus, I drunkenly passed out on a woman who left in the middle of the night and then awkwardly returned the next day to claim the stuff she’d left at my place. I went home with a woman who’d repeatedly insulted me during our date. I had sex in the Gallery (my greatest triumph). I had sex 14 times with a woman as we watched the Wimbledon final one year. (Roger Federer beat Andy Murray. It went four sets and was delayed by rain.) I took a lot of women to Atlantic City, eventually realizing that things went better when I checked into nicer hotels. I briefly hooked up with someone who worked for Philadelphia’s Licenses and Inspections division. It went about as well as dealing with L&I.
I didn’t plan to stop. Things were empty but fine. But after 103 first dates, I met the right woman; we’re still together. I still don’t know my number. But I no longer care what it is.
