Warning: It’s the dry season

IN times of drought, people can suffer from severe dehydration, which can, in turn, cause such conditions as dizziness, loss of balance and delirium.

That’s my defense, and I’m sticking with it.

There’s no other way I can explain my reaction to a few recent situations in what I am now referring to as the worst dating drought in L.A. in a decade.

To wit: I ran into an old acquaintance at a coffee shop the other day and stopped to chat. I’ve never thought ill of this person; he’s just part of a group of friends I don’t see anymore. He seems to be a nice guy, but, well, he makes me uncomfortable in a benign sort of way. I don’t think he has bodies buried in his backyard or anything, but he’s a very odd bird. I’d always thought of him as asexual, and I had never known him to date anyone.

As I walked away, I found myself thinking how attractive he looked, and I wondered if he was still single. And then I drank a couple of gallons of water in hopes of regaining my senses.

It was a mirage, and other women have told me they’ve seen them too. Without a shimmer on the horizon, those who we’ve passed by somehow start to look a whole lot brighter. For me, that wasn’t an isolated incident.

Someone I used to date called and left me several messages along the lines of, “Long time no talk,” and other highly original and witty repartee. He failed to acknowledge or apologize for the reason we stopped dating -- one night a year ago, he stood me up. He simply failed to show up at the appointed day and time, and he never called with an excuse, lame or otherwise. I had it on good authority later that he was neither jailed nor dead in a ditch, the only forgivable reasons for leaving someone to wait and wonder.

Though he had been amazingly fun, the guy was bad news, plain and simple. I could easily and quickly tick off all the reasons that he was wrong for me, and I knew it at the time. If there was ever any doubt, it was dispelled when he blew me off in the rudest and most hurtful way possible.

So, why would I even consider returning a call from Amnesia Man?

Not only did I consider it, I did it. What followed were a few voicemail exchanges, and, mercifully, no contact.

And then I called Arrowhead for home delivery.

But wait, there’s more. I had a conversation not long ago with a former boyfriend, who invited me to go hiking. Well, considering I had told him to take a hike, and the breakup a few years ago had not been pretty, why would I think about that offer even for a nanosecond?

(Why he would ask is a matter I’ll leave to his therapist.)

I told several friends about it, then watched as horrified looks crossed their faces when they could tell I was chewing on it.

There’s something about a drought that brings out people from the past, and a number of friends have said they’ve had similar experiences lately.

Do the exes have some kind of desperation divining rod? We all know why we aren’t in those relationships anymore, or why we never started them, but the passage of time can distort our memories.

I blame the drought, of course, for causing us to consider returning to wells we know are dry.

The only thing I can say is, pass the canteen and pray for rain.

T.L. Stanley can be reached at weekend@latimes.com.