Just had an awesome weekend; this came SO close to being an LR 'till I tripped five-feet from the finish line.

The first time I landed to live in the U.S. Midwest was 2001. It my first time away from home, I was 18, had no car, didn't know anyone, and I'd only ever been with one woman. Hell, I was even apprehensive about being a black man in such a Caucasian-dominant region. As soon as I took care of the car problem, I found that I had quite the wanderlust, and took the advice of a friend and decided to explore the lovely country of Canada. Long-story short, over the course of a few years, I bedded maybe 45 women -- 35 of them were Canadian. It was rare I took anything less than an 8 to bed,too.

I'd believed my ease with them was due to my being one of the few black men in an area where women desired them (law of scarcity), and that was a belief that stuck with me after I left the Midwest and experienced a massive slowdown in my dating and sex life over the next 12 years. Since leaving the Midwest for the first time, I began to question if my successes with women in the Midwest, which I hadn't experienced since I left it, were due to a law of scarcity fluke or my own skill. This weekend, thanks to a few extra dollars from a tax return, I got a definite answer to that question in several ways I didn't expect.

As I drove from the Midwest across the Canadian border, I was filled with a level of confidence and excitement I hadn't felt in years. I think that high was caused by the idea of returning to a place I had so much fun at when I was younger, and I can now see why some people get excited by their high school reunions. They know they can't have the best times of their lives back, but even to vaguely re-live them is fun. The first thing I did when I got up north was try to go to the mall and try to judge people's reactions to my very presence.

Years ago, I turned a lot of heads. This weekend, I only turned a few -- the rest just went about their business. Nothing too different from stateside.

I went to some of the old bars I hung out at; it was daytime. Things hadn't really changed at all. Some places had closed down, but that was about it.

For the most part, people responded to me as they in the U.S. As just another guy. It wasn't like that when I was teenager and exploring the great north.

After some fishin', a shower, and a shave, it was club time. I went dressed in a suit w/o a tie, Stacy Adams shoes...what I usually wear when I do a town. I talked to a few women in the club, they responded to me the same way women respond to me in the U.S., but not quite how they did when I was younger.

I found one lovely brunette at a pool table, and there was some guy who was kept trying to get her attention with playful banter, but I could tell she wasn't interested...primarily because she kept giving me short, sidelong glances. Rules of non-verbal communication went into effect -- on the third, lasting glance, I interrupted the guy who was bantering with her and opened her with a comment about her sea-shell necklace. I said it looked sexy on her, she thanked me, and then I asked her who she was rooting for to win at the pool game in front of us. She said she wasn't paying attention like that, she and her friend just usually chilled at the pool table whenever they came to the bar.

From that exchange, I found out she had an interesting choice of fashion, what she likes to do when she goes to the club, but most importantly, that she wasn't attached to any man there. It was just her and her friend. Green light.

I asked her if she played pool, she said she could when she was drunk. I told her that was pretty much everyone. She said I looked like I could play regardless and I gave her a shit-eating grin with a shrug (think Ray Liotta in the "Partners with Paulie" scene from Goodfellas.)

She smiled and said "Modest much?" I said "Ain't bragging if you can back it up." She scoffed and I introduced myself and extended my hand, she took it introduced herself, but embraced my hand in such a way it was like she pulled the back of my hand into her left breast gently.

She was a college student, so we chatted about that quite a bit. She gave me shit about being an English major graduate ("what can you do with an English major"), so I took out my business card, poked it into her chest, and said "that." She said "So, is this supposed to impress me?" I said "Couldn't give a shit if you're impressed or not; you asked what you can do with an English degree, and that's it. And I love it." I asked her what she was majoring in, and when she gave me an answer, I asked her if she though she'd love it. She told me no, but it was her best bet at putting food on the table.

I told her something I once heard but can't remember the source: "Success comes when you do something you love and find someone to pay you for it."

She paused, and then stood back to look at my suit. She then said "Seems like you've found someone to pay you pretty well, then." I told her it wasn't about money, I just needed to do something I loved for a living and I believed other things would fall into place as a result.

She looked at my business card and took out her cell phone, and acted as though she was going to send an e-mail to my work address. I asked her not to, because I didn't want a personal e-mail on my work mail (you never know who reads those.) She said she didn't want to get me in trouble, but didn't have anything else to contact me with. I just gave her my phone number, and she sent me a text so that I'd have hers, as well. She sent a photo along with that text...

I told her I'd send her a photo (clean) just to be fair, and here's where I tripped...she said "yeah, I'm hesitant to take your picture because I have a boyfriend back where live." She'd earlier said that she was in town visiting her friend. I went "Oh. Wish you told me." She goes "Yeah, I should've," but keeps looking into my eyes.

I decided to cut my losses at that point and told her to delete my number, I didn't want to get in the way of her and her boyfriend, and that I was sure he was a decent guy. Her eyes suddenly widened and she immediately replied said something I probably won't forget for a long time...

"You're being too nice."

I told her all the same, I didn't want to be responsible for her cheating on her boyfriend because I'd been on the other side of that (both of which were true.) She said in a deflated tone "Yeah, that sucks, huh." I patted her on the shoulder and left her to her night.

At the main bar, I'd earlier befriended a black man who'd immigrated from the U.S. He asked me what happened with the brunette because it seemed as though she was into me, and I told him about what the brunette had said about her boyfriend and he shrugged. He said "Oh, that's code." I asked him what he meant, and her said "That's her way of telling you she just wants a one-night thing."

Well, fuck me. Because nobody else was going to that night. I approached her one other time throughout the night when she was on the dance floor, but she'd barely speak to me, and her friend kept pulling her away.

I chatted around with a few more girls, danced with a few more besides that, and my club time was up. On the way back to the States the following morning, I considered only a few things to reach my long-desired answer:

I might be the same being that I was over a decade ago, but the teenage me and the current me have different mindsets. The current me wears suits, frequents lakes to relax, and drinks in moderation. Teenage FalynOne's wardrobe consisted of Jordans, a t-shirt, and either jeans or baggy sweats. The current me wouldn't want to hook up with a woman who had a boyfriend, but teenage me would've said "what's your man got to do with me?"

I had staggering success when I was younger because I didn't have limiting beliefs about life and love, and believed that the law of scarcity demanded I couldn't lose. The law of scarcity...now I have to realize it was akin to Dumbo's Feather (if you'll pardon the dorky analogy; I fuckin' love Dumbo.)

Forget the law of scarcity, races, environments, and even financial status. A man's success with women is dependent on his ability to intrigue them and his level of confidence in that he can do so.

"Success with women is in you and nowhere else," and I while I can't turn back to my younger, more pickup-successful state of mind, my current state of mind can evolve.