Not quite first impression, as we met briefly before.
When I was about 20, I briefly crossed paths with a friend of a friend. He and I did the whole "oooh, I like you!" flirty song and dance at each other, and a few days later, our mutual friend asked if he could give him me number. I said absolutely yes. He was so cute and funny. He called and asked me out, and we set a date to see a movie that weekend.
I had gone grocery shopping the day of, and got a bag of dried apricots, because I freaking love dried apricots. Get home, put groceries away, proceed to eat entire bag of apricots throughout the afternoon. Get ready for date, and notice my stomach starting to rumble. Rumbling gets worse and the time comes to leave to meet him. And worse. But he was so cute, and I was single. And gosh, he was cute.
By the time I got there, I had a five to ten second long death fart coming approximately every two minutes. I was really shy then, and having near full blown anxiety attacks nonstop that I was going to crap my pants and/or explode in front of him. So I kept randomly wandering 20 feet away from him to try to fart without him realizing it, then casually returning. Note - this is before cell phones, so I couldn't pretend to take a call or read a text. I behaved like a complete loonypants weirdo.
He was this really funny, sweet guy who wanted to buy a bunch of candy for us to tear into, like we decided we would on the phone. The idea of adding raisinettes and carbon dioxide to the fuel in my gut terrified me. Between the energy it returned to clench my ass and my nerves clenching the rest of my muscles, all I could do at the candy counter was shake my head no aggressively and grunt "uh huh," at his suggestions. I could see the disappointment and confusion on his face take over from the flirtatious looks and smile. He got me a Pepsi, which I took and walked 30 feet away, feeling the next one was even longer and more deadly. It was. The whole way through the movie, I just sat and kept repositioning myself, trying to find a comfortable way to sit that also let me silence the farts I was going to blame on the group of kids I strategically decided to sit behind.
I have no idea what movie we saw. I went to the ladies room at least five times during it. Even when he kept asking me if I was OK, I would squeak "yep, never better!," because this was a good looking, funny, smart guy, and I needed to make a good impression that I am a healthy, interesting woman that does not fart that he should want to see again.
I have no idea what I was thinking the entire day. I was obviously not thinking when I ate all the apricots. I don't know why, but at age 20 I think I still believed men think girls don't poop or fart, and it was my duty to the rest of womankind to not betray our secret. I also wanted to see him because he was so cute, that canceling was 100% out of the question.
He didn't ask me out again, and thankfully, I never ran into him again. I think I was relieved, as I was so unbelievably humiliated by the time we left that I'm not sure if I could have faced him again. I am now 46, and should probably reach out to our mutual friend and ask him to relay that I am not a crazy person, but had eaten a pound of dried fruit immediately before the date. I'm almost positive he is wondering to this day if I still think he believed the kids in front of us were responsible for the gas clouds in the theater.