Lots of really great questions!
I wanted to meet for dinner as I’m a rather shy person and don’t meet a lot of people (providers or otherwise), and I previously avoided someone I didn’t feel comfortable with by meeting for dinner first.
With this guy, I was especially attracted to him and decided I’d go ahead and book three hours with the intent of dinner and hotel afterwards. He seemed completely fine with it and even said he looked forward to it as recently as yesterday. The reason I chose a hotel is I felt like I would be more comfortable on neutral ground. Suffice it to say, will probably just do dinner first from now on so I can get a feel for the provider.
There are maybe 8 providers in the city where I live. I am looking for a regular provider and tend to avoid the ones that are passing through.
As requested in another post, I will provide an update if I do hear from him. I know this is exceptionally cliche, but I felt like we had made a connection over the texts back and forth, and I am genuinely concerned about him. In the end, it will be whatever it will be. He will either reach out at some point and explain what really happened, or “really happened”, or I’ll never hear from him again.
I appreciate all of the responses, as that’s all I was needing ... perspectives to help me pull back from the situation and look at things differently.