{someone} needs to figure a way to tastefully apologize to {other person} and the guy he set me up that I stood up because I have absolutely no experience when it comes to dating...
Dating is hard, at first. The idea of trusting someone enough to have a long intimate conversation with them while sharing food, entertainment, etc. is placed on a pedestal by most people under the age of 13 (this is a rounded down figure). For some the idea of dating is a horrifically awkward idea continues on well into early adulthood. Dating is straight-forward enough, you meet someone, who you may or may not know, you go to dinner with them, you talk and try to find common ground, and hopefully by the end of the date you are both mentally and physically attracted to the person enough to attempt another date, possibly even a relationship. It is a courting ritual, at that an extremely intellectual one, for assessing the viability of one's choice of mates by their intelligence and personality. Dating creates a bond, through which people can understand and begin to trust one another enough to go beyond friendship. What in the world makes it so hard for people, many of whom know the preceding things, to start dating?
The Theory.
It's a matter of experience and confidence. A lot of smart people, intellectuals, egg-heads, nerds if you will, know that dating can't be as bad as they think, yet can find themselves unable to go through with it. These people spend too much time thinking, they become self-conscious when they talk to people and are embarrassed when they can't think of anything to say. They stammer when they see someone of a preferred sex show signs of attraction to them, because they don't understand why people would be attracted to them. The entire world of dating, human interaction and sex is all unknown, because parents aren't timid with each other's feelings and porn actors are typically good enough not to stammer when they talk to each other.
These nerds are static, they haven't been able to move from not-dating since the time they where born. They've been stuck there a long time. So it is hard to get going, to go on a date requires an incredible force of will. Often it is this person's friends who apply this force, sometimes with liberal application of the mental analog to a frying pan upside the face. The moment, however, when that person gets back from their first date, it all becomes easier. They can suddenly go, “hold on, I can do better than that abusive schmuck,” or “wow, what in the world was I ever afraid of?” They can pick up a phone and call someone, set up another date, chat them up over the phone. They can do all this wonderful stuff that they had hitherto only dreaded with the fear of a child to the dark. They have overcome the static friction of dating. But, have they?
What if it went badly, they could have made a fool of themselves, they could have stammered too much, they could go back to their old way of thinking. This happens to people, they haven't overcome that friction. This is because the friction they feel doesn't exist outside their own minds, thus it could be unsurmountable. Hopefully one day they too can experience the magical moment when the static friction of dating can be the kinetic friction of a relationship. How people that can't get over a fear of dating by dating can do this is a matter of quantum psychology and I won't go into it here.
The Kinetic Friction of a Relationship.
This can be defined in two ways:
1.The friction between personalities that invariably occurs. People can disappoint and be disappointed.
2. Kinetic refers to motion, friction refers to heat generating force that occurs when two objects move vigorously while in close contact. I think you can figure out where I'm going with this.