The Da Vinci Code Guide To Dating

By Justin Lawrence Trawick

I've never really been very good at dating. In fact, I think I can safely say that I am pretty oblivious to the whole practice. It always seems that the person that I really want to get to know has no interest in me and the person who actually does want to get to know doesn't register on my date-worthy radar (when most of the time they should have and I kick myself the rest of the day for another missed chance).

Recently graduated from college, I now travel every day into DC for my job, which is about an hour and fifteen minute commute. The third (and last) leg of my commute is the DC metro, which I am on every morning and evening for about twenty minutes. Since starting my job over three months ago I made two inital realizations. One, the metro is full of beautiful women, women that I had no idea could be so goodlooking, women so goodlooking you find yourself having to completely turn around in order not to stare in utter amazment that someone so beautiful actually has to work as opposed to just being handed money every day from countless thankful men completely satisfied with the twenty minutes of pure bliss they recieved before going to their nine to five job.

The second thing I learned, however, is that men cannot talk to these women. It is basically an unwritten law of the metro that if speak to a lady on the metro you're considered dangerous, unpredictable, and completely undesireable. You can't even make eye contact for fear of a women screaming in terror (this is different for gay men, however, who's whole dating technique revolves around eye contact, as I've been told from the several gay men in my office).

Now, before I got my ipod a few weeks ago I was reading every day on the metro. About a month ago I had just finished a book and hadn't been able to buy a new one so I grabbed my copy of the "DaVinci Code" by Dan Brown, which I'd already read, and took it with me. Upon entering the train I sat down and began to skim the book and litterally less than thirty seconds went by before the first "unobtainable" woman came up to me talking to me about the book. Twenty minutes later I had talked with three different women and recieved two business cards, complete with personally written home phone numbers on the back.

This became a fun experiment for me for the next week. For the first few days I continued using the DaVinci Code and recieved the same results. Next, I tried using some different books written by the same author and actually recieved better results, which I thought was amazing. Lastly, I tried a much lesser known novel on the last day and recieved no results whatsoever. Clearly, author Dan Brown has unconsciously created the perfect "coffee-table" novel, able to spark conversation instantly due to its international fame and controversial content.

However, as mentioned, now I use my much loved ipod every day and reserve my reading for home, thus ceasing the "DaVinci Code Guide To Dating", or at least for the time being. However, every once in awhile, when I notice a woman reading one of Dan Brown's novels, I do sum up the courage to go ask about the their opinion of the book. Who knows, maybe it is possible to find Mrs. Right on the metro...