Flunking Match.com
I joined Match.com on the advice of a friend who met her truly wonderful husband on the site. I should add that she lives on another coast and that it may be easier to meet someone wonderful on that coast, but I digress. I paid my money, posted a photo and a long, humorous description of myself, my foibles, likes and dislikes, my magazine subscriptions and the books I've read most recently. Then I waited. I am still waiting. So far, I've had two responses from "favorites". Both wrote back to say that they'd already met someone.
Years before, I had been a pioneer in the then-relatively new dating phenomenom known as "the personals". In those days, one wrote an earnest and perhaps somewhat clever note, enclosed a photo and sent it off to a post box number. I met a dozen nice guys and dated most of them, at least briefly. I even posted a personal ad that mentioned nude-sunbathing and my love of NBA basketball. I got 125 responses from a slew of men. Going through the envelopes, hooting at some of the photos and carefully filing most of the responses took a week. A year or so later, I met and eventually married a guy I met through friends. Goodbye personals.
Hello, "online dating" and goodbye to the memory of my earlier successes. Match.com is way more complicated. First off, your photo should be professionally done and preferably in soft focus past a certain age. (These are the rules for women, not men---or the rules as I've interpreted them). If you make it past the eye-candy stage, there is a whole other set of challenges you must meet because these men are extremely particular. You should carry no emotional baggage, no extra poundage, and no extreme opinions. You should be widely-traveled and preferably speak more than one language fluently. An exciting, well-paid career is enticing, as is having an ex-husband with deep pockets who still plays a professional sport. (I made up that last part). You should like James Patterson novels and still believe that Ayn Rand is profound. You must enjoy "PDA". That's not a term that I'd ever heard until college when we all poked fun at the very idea, but these guys are into it. PDA equals hand-holding, back rubs and impromptu hugs and kisses. Ick.
Some of these "profiles" literally leave me slack-jawed. One 50-something man in over-sized, out of date eyeglass frames that made him look like a bug with a comb-over, expressed his requirement for a woman "who can cook up a delicious meal in less than five minutes from just the ingredients on-hand." He allowed that because he spoke 8 languages fluently, his perfect woman should be at the very least bi-lingual. It was clear that he considered this last a benificent lowering of his standards but since any woman would be thrilled to have such urbanity, such erudition, such...pomposity, he would just have to make do. What an ass. I was tempted to type him a quick note that said "Hey Bud, get some glasses frames from this century and then we'll parlez". I resisted temptation.
I am also sometimes tempted to tap a quick note when I see "flotsam" in my morning catch. (Each morning I get an email with the "daily catch". The Match.com computer churns away at night and then at about 0300, it fires off an email with a list of men, with photos, who match at least 71% of my keywords.) "Flotsam" is my term for good-looking, crazy picky guys who circulate between Craigslist and Match.com. They wash up on the shore from time to time and I always wonder what's going on with these men? They seem so perfect. At least in Times New Roman, they're funny, self-effacing, spectacularly well-employed and generally appealing. There's one guy--an MD, Jewish, great-looking, sounds wonderful--who I see over and over again. Finally I gave into temptation. I wrote him a reply that began with "Fancy Meeting You Here....Again". The gist of my note was "what gives?" Surprisingly, I never heard back. Perhaps he's wading through thousands of online responses...but I doubt it. Just this morning I saw a guy I dated briefly last spring. He's a great guy, we just had no physical chemistry. I was sorry to see that he hasn't met "the one" yet.
"Holding hands" and "the one". These are the two "criteria" most likely to make me vomit as I sort my "daily catch". Many of these men sound like overly-serious 16 year olds with not-so-latent Hallmark greeting card syndrome. They want to meet "the one woman who can be my best friend and my soulmate" through life. Ick. Male Cinderellas without the shabby clothes, that's how I view them. And the PDA makes me bilious as well. "I like to hold hands in public, while walking in the rain". Really? I like to thumb wrestle in dark bars while playing parcheesi..just kidding. You see the problem....
I dated one really great guy for a while (Craigslist, not Match.com) who insisted on holding hands all the time. It drove me bananas. He not only insisted on holding hands, but he insisted on rubbing his thumb up and down against my palm while we held hands. It was if he wanted to constantly remind me that he was there. I remember we were sitting in a movie--"Away From Her"--wonderful, moving film about a long-married couple dealing with Alzheimer's. I'm totally blown away by the acting, the compelling story and the raw emotion of such a situation. I want to focus...but I can't, because Mr. Needy is busily distracting me with the annoying "thumb rub". I wanted to smack him but I resisted. After a while though, the lousy sex and the constant need to hold hands drove me to drop him.
That's the thing really--I just want a nice guy who doesn't drive me nuts. My male buddy doesn't drive me nuts but he also lives two hours away. I want a Jewish guy who picks up his socks, who likes to watch football and likes kids. A guy who can cook but doesn't feel the need to reveal this to everyone he meets. A guy who doesn't need to chit-chat while biking up a steep hill and can ride along-side without swerving into me. A guy who knows a bit about wine but doesn't eat red meat. But probably my two most important criteria are picking up socks and liking kids. That's it...I want a sole-mate who likes kids. No wonder I'm a crashing failure on Match.com. I'm not picky enough.....
Years before, I had been a pioneer in the then-relatively new dating phenomenom known as "the personals". In those days, one wrote an earnest and perhaps somewhat clever note, enclosed a photo and sent it off to a post box number. I met a dozen nice guys and dated most of them, at least briefly. I even posted a personal ad that mentioned nude-sunbathing and my love of NBA basketball. I got 125 responses from a slew of men. Going through the envelopes, hooting at some of the photos and carefully filing most of the responses took a week. A year or so later, I met and eventually married a guy I met through friends. Goodbye personals.
Hello, "online dating" and goodbye to the memory of my earlier successes. Match.com is way more complicated. First off, your photo should be professionally done and preferably in soft focus past a certain age. (These are the rules for women, not men---or the rules as I've interpreted them). If you make it past the eye-candy stage, there is a whole other set of challenges you must meet because these men are extremely particular. You should carry no emotional baggage, no extra poundage, and no extreme opinions. You should be widely-traveled and preferably speak more than one language fluently. An exciting, well-paid career is enticing, as is having an ex-husband with deep pockets who still plays a professional sport. (I made up that last part). You should like James Patterson novels and still believe that Ayn Rand is profound. You must enjoy "PDA". That's not a term that I'd ever heard until college when we all poked fun at the very idea, but these guys are into it. PDA equals hand-holding, back rubs and impromptu hugs and kisses. Ick.
Some of these "profiles" literally leave me slack-jawed. One 50-something man in over-sized, out of date eyeglass frames that made him look like a bug with a comb-over, expressed his requirement for a woman "who can cook up a delicious meal in less than five minutes from just the ingredients on-hand." He allowed that because he spoke 8 languages fluently, his perfect woman should be at the very least bi-lingual. It was clear that he considered this last a benificent lowering of his standards but since any woman would be thrilled to have such urbanity, such erudition, such...pomposity, he would just have to make do. What an ass. I was tempted to type him a quick note that said "Hey Bud, get some glasses frames from this century and then we'll parlez". I resisted temptation.
I am also sometimes tempted to tap a quick note when I see "flotsam" in my morning catch. (Each morning I get an email with the "daily catch". The Match.com computer churns away at night and then at about 0300, it fires off an email with a list of men, with photos, who match at least 71% of my keywords.) "Flotsam" is my term for good-looking, crazy picky guys who circulate between Craigslist and Match.com. They wash up on the shore from time to time and I always wonder what's going on with these men? They seem so perfect. At least in Times New Roman, they're funny, self-effacing, spectacularly well-employed and generally appealing. There's one guy--an MD, Jewish, great-looking, sounds wonderful--who I see over and over again. Finally I gave into temptation. I wrote him a reply that began with "Fancy Meeting You Here....Again". The gist of my note was "what gives?" Surprisingly, I never heard back. Perhaps he's wading through thousands of online responses...but I doubt it. Just this morning I saw a guy I dated briefly last spring. He's a great guy, we just had no physical chemistry. I was sorry to see that he hasn't met "the one" yet.
"Holding hands" and "the one". These are the two "criteria" most likely to make me vomit as I sort my "daily catch". Many of these men sound like overly-serious 16 year olds with not-so-latent Hallmark greeting card syndrome. They want to meet "the one woman who can be my best friend and my soulmate" through life. Ick. Male Cinderellas without the shabby clothes, that's how I view them. And the PDA makes me bilious as well. "I like to hold hands in public, while walking in the rain". Really? I like to thumb wrestle in dark bars while playing parcheesi..just kidding. You see the problem....
I dated one really great guy for a while (Craigslist, not Match.com) who insisted on holding hands all the time. It drove me bananas. He not only insisted on holding hands, but he insisted on rubbing his thumb up and down against my palm while we held hands. It was if he wanted to constantly remind me that he was there. I remember we were sitting in a movie--"Away From Her"--wonderful, moving film about a long-married couple dealing with Alzheimer's. I'm totally blown away by the acting, the compelling story and the raw emotion of such a situation. I want to focus...but I can't, because Mr. Needy is busily distracting me with the annoying "thumb rub". I wanted to smack him but I resisted. After a while though, the lousy sex and the constant need to hold hands drove me to drop him.
That's the thing really--I just want a nice guy who doesn't drive me nuts. My male buddy doesn't drive me nuts but he also lives two hours away. I want a Jewish guy who picks up his socks, who likes to watch football and likes kids. A guy who can cook but doesn't feel the need to reveal this to everyone he meets. A guy who doesn't need to chit-chat while biking up a steep hill and can ride along-side without swerving into me. A guy who knows a bit about wine but doesn't eat red meat. But probably my two most important criteria are picking up socks and liking kids. That's it...I want a sole-mate who likes kids. No wonder I'm a crashing failure on Match.com. I'm not picky enough.....
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