I went on a date the other day. It was on a day that I was in the office and he’d chosen a location to meet that was on my way home from work and I honestly loved that. I don’t mind going out of my way to meet someone but I love that he put thought into this.

I got there a few minutes earlier than him but when he pulled up to park his car next to me the first thing he asked was ‘was the parking okay?’ and again, it just felt really nice. I’d said that parking is something I stress about but even in the excitement and awkwardness of meeting someone new it was the first thing on his mind.

When he got out of his car, I noticed he was wearing colourful, stripy socks. I kind of knew at that point that we’d have a good time.

And we did. He’s lovely. We walked, we talked, we laughed.

It probably wasn’t like my usual date. I don’t mean the walking or talking. I mean more the content of the talking. He was very open about a lot of things. His family, his situation, he told me a lot of things about his unusual childhood, he showed me photos of his children.

I think it’s so easy in this day and age to be really closed off to other people, to be distrustful, to hold your cards a little closer to your chest especially about your kids’ names or whatever. I can’t tell if it’s the right thing to do to be reserved or if we should be more open. I know that I fall more into one side of the camp than the other so it did feel a little like being in unknown territory with him.

He did this thing and I didn’t know how I felt about it at the time. But in the days before we’d met he’d gone on a trip with his friends to do this cool thing. He had said that when we met up he’d show me photos of the cool thing but I thought it was one of those things that people said.

But no, I asked him about his trip and he pulled out his phone, opened his photos app, scrolled to the last image and handed me his phone. You can scroll through if you want, he said. And so I did.

He’d shared one or two of the photos with me already. One of him smiling on a beach that I loved. But the others were more candid. And included his friends. As I was scrolling through his phone I was really hit with this feeling like, how are there people like this? Just so open to share these parts of their lives with a near stranger like me?

Am I just really distrustful and cynical? I don’t want to be that person. But I fear I am. Or maybe it’s just that he could tell that I’m harmless? That I wouldn’t abuse the trust he’d given me by sharing the personal parts of his life with me? I hope that’s the case.

In any case, I had a lovely time.