Meeting Jordan Breen: A Craigslist Story

The night I fell (literally) for a strange man from the internet

The weirdest thing about death in this modern age is that your digital footprint lives on. And in this case for Jordan, through his work, his personality lives on forever. However, as an ex-girlfriend, I knew Jordan different from his online personality and I’ve been scouring his digital footprint to find more than just him talking about MMA. I always thought of Jordan as something similar to a cartoon character. He was outrageous and goofy with catchphrases and a mysterious backstory. Very little of his personal story exists online and while mourning, I’ve become desperate to find pieces of him that showed the side of him I knew and loved. And then I found the email from 2014 of how I first met Jordan Breen. And this is the version of Jordan that deserves to live within his digital footprint as well. As being absolutely (perfectly) insane.

The first night I met Jordan was in 2014, at Bathurst subway station in Toronto, Ontario. We had met online. Not Tinder, not even Facebook. But Craigslist. Yes, Craigslist. I constantly scoured the personal ads, laughing at the ridiculousness of “man seeking woman for a night of fun”. What absolute batshit woman would ever be inclined to respond? I was never someone who responded to any ads, merely observed the absurdity from a safe distance.

Until one night.

I was brand new to Toronto and knew nobody. I had spent my last $20 on a bottle of cheap Rosé that I accidentally dropped on my way home instead of buying myself groceries. Friday night, no friends, no booze, I posted my first (and only) Craigslist ad purely just for the purpose of keeping me entertained. In the platonic section, of course. (I’m not totally crazy.) Over 60+ messages came in of men willing to travel from around the city to meet an early 20s platinum blonde at the drop of a hat. That’s when a message came in.

Subject: RE: Your Craigslist steez.

“You,

As a longtime massive Craigslist lurker, and someone who moved from the East Coast a few months back, I appreciate your circumstance. I'm a 26-year-old white dude, I work a strange and exotic internet-related job so I've got a good amount of time to adventure, party and so forth. I'm a big live music fiend and usually do at least one show a week. I've got a voracious musical appetite, but to avoid the "Oh, I like everything!", I'll add that I particularly love hip-hop, psych rock, and the more danceable the punk/metal, the better.

Pictures attached for verification purposes and so you know I'm not some complete mutant. I'd be honored to show you around the city and assuage the obvious anxieties that go with moving to the city and not knowing a soul.

Hope to hear from you soon.

-j”

Photos attached that he was not a complete mutant, and his writing skills proved he had a personality more exciting than the average Craigslist responder. He seemed to put it frankly- weird but intriguing. And I had agreed to meet him. Every parent everywhere would be cringing that their new-to-the-city daughter was agreeing to meet a stranger from Craigslist, but here I was waiting in the subway station for what would be the infamous Jordan Breen.

What showed up was a bearded man wearing blue and green leopard skinny jeans, studded combat boots, a dark green leather jacket, and a printed button-down (I cannot remember the pattern, but I can only imagine clashed with the rest of his outfit). Oh, and spiked mohawk.

Jordan took me to Sneaky Dee’s, a punk dive bar known for its Mexican food and graffiti-ridden decor. As I spent my last few dollars on my dropped bottle of wine, Jordan encouraged me to eat dinner while he talked at me. Everyone knows that Jordan talks fast, and somehow I managed to keep up in between bites of burrito. He thought my mannerisms were humourous, though I think I unintentionally mirrored his. I remember being in awe of the way he spoke. It was almost Dr.Seuss-like in the way he used too many descriptive words, but we were both in tears from laughing at each other. He ordered a slice of apple pie, insisting Sneaky Dee’s (the dive Mexican restaurant) had the best apple pie. He then ordered a second slice of it.

There are few moments in life where time stops and you have a guttural feeling that “this moment is going to be significant to the rest of my life.”

However, this was one of those moments.

In an incredibly gentlemanly gesture Jordan later described as “obviously I was trying to get you back to my house”, Jordan invited me to come back to his place to “see the pretty rooftop.” Jordan lived at a major intersection in the core of downtown Toronto, and his roof was on top of a Yonge Street storefront. This wasn’t a condo-rooftop or patio, this was climbing onto a rooftop of a commercial building storefront. But you could see all the lights of downtown from up there. Now vodka-fuelled, I continued on my journey with a stranger from Craigslist. Getting up to the roof required a bit of a climb, but he was right, the lights of the city illuminated the rooftop, making it the perfect place to take a girl in an attempt to impress her. I never dared to ask how many girls had been up there before me, and to this day, I will delusionally assume I was the one and only.

What was not known by either of us was the rom-com-like saga that followed of getting off the rooftop. Jordan got down first, assuring me that he would help me if I struggled. As I shimmied my butt to the edge of the roof to leap down, my tight knit skirt got caught on the edge of the roof rolling my skirt up to my stomach.

I was now hanging from a roof in my underwear with a stranger from Craigslist standing underneath me.

Looking back now, the hilarity of the situation would be intense foreshadowing of what kind of relationship I would have with Jordan, however, at the time I was mortified. Jordan had to play it incredibly cool and instruct me to unhook my skirt from the part of the roof it was stuck on, assuring me he would catch me. I detached myself from the roof, and in true Nicholas Sparks novel fashion, knocked him over as I fell, falling directly on top of him. Jordan later revealed that “seeing a hot blonde girl hanging from his rooftop in her underwear was something out of a Penthouse letter.” And that he “purposely fell back so I would have to fall on top of him.”

Idiot.

After that night, intense infatuation is the only way both of us could describe it. And he became the most important person in my life.

The way that Jordan could turn everything into a story was not just by the way he spoke, but the constant desire to turn something simple into an adventure. There was a child-like wonder in Jordan. He was constantly quizzical and was always interested in deepening the story (and one of his many traits I’ve taken from him). Anyone lucky enough to experience Jordan will have a story like this, and they’re incredibly telling of what kind of person he was outside of his online presence. (Absolutely insane.)

The Jordan saga of my life spanned many years, and though good and bad, nothing will ever take away from the magical story of hanging from a man from Craigslist’s rooftop in my underwear. Jordan, you will always have a piece of my heart and that roof will (sadly) always have a piece of my skirt.

This is a Jordan Breen story that wasn’t going to make his digital footprint. But, now the internet gets to have this story too.

Rest in peace, Jordan. I know you’re still laughing at me from heaven. 🕊 🍃