A Love Letter to First Dates

When you're a woman using an online dating website, you get *a lot* of messages from guys. All of my single female friends confirm that's been their experience. For a single woman, it seems like having interest from a lot of guys would be a dating panacea, but that's not the case at all. Most of the men are too something: too old, too young, too married, too uninteresting, too encumbered by life's messy circumstances, too geographically undesirable, etc. It's an embarrassment of faux riches -- emphasis on embarrassment -- all that male interest. Think of it like this: Online dating is like having cable tv. You get 500 channels, but only three are interesting enough to actually watch.

July was the month of the long-distance suitor. And when I say 'long-distance,' I don't mean guys who live 30 miles away in another part of LA. I mean long-ass-distance, like Arizona, Italy, and Denmark. I don't understand why a man would waste his time writing me a long thoughtfully composed message expressing his interest in me when there's almost no chance it could evolve into something local and real. Winning the lottery seems more likely. Of course, they may be looking for *only* an epistolary romance that plays out over the course of many emails. That may be all their messy life circumstances will allow. 

An epistolary romance might work for some people, but I'm not one of them. Although I adore highly verbal men and appreciate a well written letter, I want the angsty, butterflies-in-the-stomach experience of a real first date. I want the smile and the direct eye contact. I want the awkward pauses in the conversation because you're too gobsmacked by each other to be able to think in words. I want the spontaneous jokes that erupt organically during the evening. I want the not-knowing whether he's going to kiss me at the end of the date. I want the unexpected euphoria that comes when you realize you feel a real connection. Even with all of my many awful first dates, I'd gamble on a first date over a love letter any day.

Fighting with Slightly Dim Strangers

There is a joke in my dating profile that many men don't seem to understand. I have included one of the biggest online dating cliches ever written -- Living life to the fullest!!!!!!! -- which is funny by itself because of its insistent, obvious exaggeration. (Really? The fullest?! How can you be living life to the fullest if you're single, yet you want to be part of a couple? And so much so, that you're willing to subject yourself to the freak show of online dating?!) But the real punchline follows that cliche as a parenthetical, illuminating statement:

I am LIVING LIFE TO THE FULLEST!!!!!!!

(That'll show my jackass ex-husband what an amazing woman I am!!!!!). 

The joke isn't me calling my ex-husband a jackass. The joke is iterating the subtext that I think prompts such overly emphatic statements of living the fullest life. The second line mocks the first one. But it only really works if one recognizes that 'Living life to the fullest!!!!' is the stalest of cliches. And most guys who contact me don't. I usually won't waste my time with the guys who include a comment about what a jackass my ex-husband must be (or what a jackass their ex is), so the joke serves as a filter for my kind of sense of humor. But sometimes I'm trying to figure out if the guy is in on the joke, as I did recently with a local 47-year-old British ex-pat photographer who claims to be transitioning into writing.

British Guy: your husband was a douche...  

Me: Quit flirting.

British Guy: he was an a hole!

Me: Now it's not just flirting -- you're taking off your shirt. Stop it.

British Guy: What do i have to say to get YOUR shirt off?

Me: Well, not *that*.

British Guy: I'm getting that you don't speak English very well. Or that you can't string more than a couple of words together at a time. Maybe you didn't do so well at school. Not sure what's going on, but it's a little weird. Are you a man?

Me: Yes, me is dumb. Me flunky-flunks village skool in old country of youthtimes of mine personage. The face cheeks of me are fired color red, sting like bulgaria village dunce shame.

I should have just walked away without comment. I know. I shouldn't have engaged in what is the online dating equivalent of that chest-poking right before an incomprehensibly stupid bar fight breaks out. But sometimes slightly dim online jackasses need to be chest-poked with their own idiocy. And I'm, more often than not, happy to do it.

Mr. Hard-Sell

I didn't mean to incite his interest every time I checked for new messages on the dating website. I was merely being lazy, always using the link that opened to *his* profile page, instead of creating a new link to the general home page or my own profile. He initially contacted me a few months ago, not long after I lost my good sense and went back to online dating. His first message to me was kind of over the top with a paragraph of generic compliments in Italian, as well as marveling at our 99% match compatibility. I checked out his page and decided I wasn't interested. He spent much of his lengthy profile talking about his vocation as a lecturer and his many new media projects, which I found exhausting. I could only assume meeting him in person would be even more so. And I didn't like his profile picture either, which featured him at a podium mid-lecture poking the air with all the authority and conviction of a cult leader.

Almost every time I got online to check my messages, he would visit my profile or send me a message cajoling me to agree to a date or at least a phone call. I was turned off by his hard-sell used-car-salesman approach. Instead of 'What do I have to do to get you into this car today?', Mr. Hard-Sell sent me messages like this:

Hard-Sell:  Noticed you stopped by my profile. Wondering what I need to do... to get you to respond to my note. Any suggestions? (Be careful... this is a trick question).

I only responded once with a brief message saying that what I needed was time, since I was very busy at the moment. But because I kept using the link to his profile to open up the dating website in my phone, he must have thought I kept obsessively checking out his profile, as if I found the question of whether I should go out with him or not as complex a question as "What is the human condition?"

Hard-Sell: Maybe we can touch base this weekend. If you want, leave me your number and a good time to chat. And I'll give you a call. 

I did not reply, assuming that he'd just get weary of continuing this one-sided email convo with a no-name mute.

Hard-Sell: Hey... it's a holiday weekend. Good time to go to the beach. Why don't we rendezvous in Santa Monica? Sometime this afternoon or tomorrow. Tell me what you think. Ciao bella.

No reply from me, yet I still continued to use the link to his profile page as a sort of default home page for the dating website.

Hard-Sell: Hey... you're still here. I'm still here. Don't you think we should get on the phone... and see if there's a spark? Pretty easy to do. <his phone number> Or send me your number and a good time to chat. 

Now he was just annoying me. I continued to give him the silent treatment.

Hard-Sell: I see you poking around. I know you're interested. I don't know what's holding you back. Quell your curiosity. Send me a note. I promise not to bite (well, maybe just a little). Sogni d'oro bella.

Nope, still not interested. I'm just lazy. When I finally pushed his patience to the limit, I received a very terse note with not even one word of Italian in it.

Hard-Sell: Talk to me. <Plus his name and phone number>.

I suspect his final email to me will consist of just one glorious, fitting word: Bitch.

Must You Persist With That Annoying Hopefulness? (Part 3)

In my last two blog posts, I explored the first six circles of online-dating Hell. This time I will examine the last three circles of internet-dating Hell. As in Dante's Inferno, the last three circles contain the worst of Hell's bounty. Naturally--because I'm lucky that way--I've had a lot of interaction with bottom-circle-dwellers. In fact, I'm sort of a magnet for these three types, who seek out gullible dupes like me willing to give everyone the benefit of the doubt.

The Seventh Circle of internet-dating Hell is comprised of those who are going through the motions of online dating for purely ego-driven reasons. These are the guys who will ply you with a persistent charm offensive until you agree to meet for that first date, then bail on you with a cryptic "I'm sorry" the day of. The ego-driven guy is just looking for the validation that he can get any woman of his choosing to agree to go out with him. I suspect Aging Hipster was the first ego-driven guy who did this to me, but sadly not the last. Only last month, I got spanked again by another guy who behaved as though an ego boost is the only thing he really wants from online dating.

The most recent ego-driven guy had been online chatting with me on and off over the course of five weeks. He asked lots of questions about me, while revealing very little about himself. He asked me out a couple of times, but I was always busy. He claimed he was a comedy writer, but he didn't squander a lot of his comedy-writing skills on me. I was on the fence about meeting him, because he's nine years older and his alleged career success is frankly intimidating to me. If it happened, fine. But I wasn't agonizing over any lost opportunities to meet him. Eventually, we settled on an evening that worked for both of us. On the morning of our date, "Ego Boost" bowed out with a brief "I'm really, really sorry, but I have to cancel tonight." Could something legitimate have come up to interfere with our planned first date? Of course. Maybe his basement flooded or he got gout or things worked out with someone else he'd been pursuing online. But it just didn't feel as if his cancellation was due to an outside circumstance. It's the no-attempt-at-an-explanation cancellation and no follow-up that makes me think it was just another older guy trying to jump start his ego.

The Eighth Circle of internet-dating Hell is reserved for the Fraudulent, which includes an overflowing subset just for liars, who are legion on dating websites. Among the worst of the fraudulent are the married men who pretend to be single and lead double lives. Think Scott Peterson, who was convicted of killing his pregnant young wife when he decided he enjoyed dating more than being married. But many of the fraudulent are just small-time liars, with no agenda other than making themselves more attractive as a potential first date. The small-time liar prevaricates about his age, his occupation, or his height, just to be less likely to be dismissed before a first date happens.

One of the more benign encounters I've had with a liar involved a guy who responded to my sarcastic dating profile with a hilarious email that ended by asking me to call him "Nutsey." I eagerly obliged, and we started a dueling-banjos sort of back-and-forth with funny emails. Even though Nutsey is 58, three years older than my preferred age range of 45 to 55, I was intrigued by his comedy-writing background and that he's currently writing a book about economics. He asked me out, and I agreed to meet him for a drink and karaoke at a restaurant located about halfway between our places. A few hours before our date, Nutsey texted me to check in and see if we were still on.

Nutsey: I need to come clean about something. 

Me: Oh, I don't like the sound of that.

Nutsey: I'm not really 58. I just celebrated my 64th birthday a few weeks ago. You are free to cancel with no hard feelings of course.

Me: Nutsey!!!!!!! Are you *trying* to get into my blog?!

Nutsey: No, just your pants. ;)

Me: Ha! Don't you get into trouble when you claim to be younger than you really are?

Nutsey: Not really. Women usually say they're younger than their real age, and it turns out to be a wash.

I reluctantly bowed out, telling him I wasn't comfortable dating someone who's at a different stage of life than me. Sometimes I regret not meeting Nutsey in person. He was very funny. But I think I saved myself the likely anguish of dating someone who fundamentally isn't right for me.

The Ninth Circle of internet-dating Hell contains the very worst kind of online dater. In Inferno, Dante designated the Treacherous as the sinners of the Ninth Circle of Hell, condemned to live out eternity frozen in a lake as cold as their hearts. The Treacherous dater at his core lacks empathy. Because he has no real intuitive ability to empathize with you, his needs *always* supersede yours. In fact, the most hardcore Treacherous dater lacks the ability to even recognize that you have needs that are different than his. These are the sociopaths who will use you as a tool to get what they want. You are merely a means to their end. A classic example is the charming sociopath who sweeps a woman off her feet, marries her, and wipes out her bank account before skipping town. That hasn't happened to me (yet), but I don't rule it out as a possibility in the same way that I don't rule out death by killer bees or quicksand. I can't blithely assume it would never happen to me.

A more common sociopath is the narcissist who needs constant praise and adoration from you. He is an emotional vampire who will suck the life out of you and discard you when you no longer adequately serve that purpose. The narcissist is especially treacherous because he's charming and charismatic in the beginning while he's luring you into his heartless lair. Nothing will cure a narcissist, so get out as soon as you recognize your honey bunny is one. Being romantically involved with a guy who lacks empathy or is merely empathy-challenged is the dating equivalent of being the frog in the pot of water on the stove. You will not realize the damage to your psyche until you're suffering from third-degree burns.

Seriously, Abandon All Hope (Part 2)

If you've never had the first-hand experience of using online dating to search for love, you might be rolling your eyes, thinking 'Here she goes again with much ado about nothing -- going on about a few bad first dates. Suck it up, Frosty.' Anyone who's a veteran of internet dating knows I'm not exaggerating the emotional whiplash of this wild ride. Looking for a romantic partner who will be much more than a booty call is an exhausting process when you do it online. Part of the exhaustion comes from trying to recognize the inhabitants of the Nine Circles of internet dating Hell before you make the mistake of going out with them.

In last week's blog, I looked at the first three circles: Limbo, Lust, and Gluttony. This week I examine the middle three circles. We left off at the Fourth Circle of Hell, which, in Dante's Inferno, is filled with the Greedy, including both the avaricious and the wastefully prodigal. But I would use a different word to describe those who dwell in the Fourth Circle of internet dating Hell: the Entitled -- those who believe they are deserving of, or entitled to, certain special privileges because of who they are. You can see it in the highly successful guy who has the attitude that any woman should feel grateful to date him because of his success. Or the entitled hot woman who believes anyone she dates should feel lucky because of her "rare" stunning physical beauty. (Hey, I live in LA, where stunning physical beauty is as common as Starbucks locations.) They're often high maintenance and have an attitude that their needs always come first -- or worse, that their needs are the only ones that matter. 

The Fifth Circle of internet dating Hell is reserved for those consumed by anger. This ring is typified by the Angry Guy, who is disillusioned by intimate romantic relationships in general because he's never adequately processed his angry feelings about previous relationships that went wrong. (His female counterpart is Angry Girl, who can't stop bashing her ex to everyone within earshot.) Angry Guy is resentful not only of his former wives and girlfriends, but of the *entire* female gender. He's the guy who writes disparagingly of women on his dating profile. "I'm just looking for some fun with an attractive, fit, SANE woman until she decides to go loco on me," wrote a guy I not-at-all-sarcastically call "He Seems Nice." Angry Guy often speaks in broad sweeping negative generalizations about women. Yeah, sign me up for some of that shit. 

Heretics -- the ones who go against commonly accepted doctrine -- comprise the Sixth Circle of internet dating Hell. Within the context of online dating, a commonly accepted doctrine is the idea that everyone is looking for that one special partner with whom to spend the rest of one's life. Ha! Tell that to the swingers and the polyamorous, who reject the conventional idea that everyone has one soulmate with whom we naturally, magically pair up. Reading one's online dating messages is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're going to get.

Stay tuned...

Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here

"ABANDON ALL HOPE, YE WHO ENTER HERE," should be legally required in 72-point type on the home page of every internet dating website. It's that famous quote from Dante's Inferno, the foreboding inscription on the gates of Hell as Virgil leads Dante into the depths of despair. But the funny thing is, it also applies equally well to internet dating. At the risk of sounding histrionic and decidedly non-midwestern, online dating websites are a contemporary version of Hell. If that seems like hyperbole, let me double-down by saying that if Dante were writing Inferno today, he would be describing the people who populate the nine circles of Internet Dating Hell.

The First Circle is Limbo, a collection of men (and women) who are stuck in a transitional state that makes them neither completely available nor completely unavailable. These are the married men with no intention of ending their marriage, and who, for various reasons, are dating on the side, often with their spouse's tacit or openly acknowledged approval. It could be the men who stay in an unhappy marriage for the sake of their children or a family-run business, but have sexual and/or emotional needs that are not being met by their wife. Rodeo Clown, the Montana businessman/rancher looking for an out-of-town cowgirl he can pay to be his once-a-month girlfriend, is one of these lost souls in Limbo.

But it's not just attached men in complicated, ambiguous relationships in this First Circle. The emotionally unavailable guy is here in droves, stuck in this limbo despite many attractive opportunities to escape. He *claims* to be looking for the love of his life with whom he can finally settle down after all these years, but she never ultimately materializes because he's simply too uncomfortable in a truly intimate committed relationship. He's that lifelong middle-aged bachelor who has never been married or had a live-in girlfriend.

The Second Circle of Internet Dating Hell is filled with all the men consumed by Lust -- which at first seems like 100% of them. The distinction is between those men who, despite their better judgment, *act* on their lust, and those men who do not let the shiny-metal distraction of lust unduly influence their dating decisions. These are the guys who have no emotional interest in you; their interest is purely physical. You're not their "relationship type," just their physical type. These are the guys who are prone to choosing a trophy wife in their first, second or third marriages, instead of an "appropriate" woman who is similar in age, smarts, and physical appearance. In LA, there seems to be an excessive amount of personal trainers biding their time in the Second Circle.

The sexual Gluttons inhabit the Third Circle of Internet Dating Hell. There are many guys in their 20s who loiter for a time in the Gluttony Circle, but many will eventually move on as they grow tired of the exhausting chase to nail new tail. But some never grow out of it, and continue to choose the short-lived pleasures of quantity over quality. To them, online dating is a cheap sexual buffet where they can stuff themselves with gigantic portions of crapass all-you-can-eat food. I am not amused when these Gluttons regard me as if I were a large tub of fettuccine alfredo at their own personal Souplantation.

Three rings down, six to go. To be continued...

Distracted by Boy Toys and a Rodeo Clown

It's been two months since I went back on the online dating website to shop for potential boyfriends. Surprisingly, I've been contacted by a few guys who messaged me the first time I was on this website. Aging Hipster sent me the world's *second* laziest message: the word "Hilarious" followed by his first name. The world's laziest message is "Hi," which I receive several times a day from mouth-breathing dullards trolling the website for *any* woman who might respond.

Remember Mensa, the pear-shaped man with the avuncular presence who has a thing for women who like to talk politics? Well, evidentally he doesn't remember me, because he sent me a long, funny message introducing himself. His profile is exactly the same brief, hilarious one that grabbed my attention almost two years ago. I didn't have the heart to respond to him. What would I say?! "Hi. We already went on a date. Don't you remember me?" It seemed kinder to ignore him than to reply and underscore the message, 'You're a nice guy, but I'm still not interested in dating you.'

I've had four guys in their early 20s who've specifically offered to be my "Boy Toy." WTH?! Boy Toys are strictly for famous women who've entered that dissolute decade that often comes during their 50s or 60s, when all they do is sit around in brightly colored caftans drinking strong cocktails by the pool. I don't own a caftan! I'm a regular middle-aged woman, not Cher. I don't play with toys. Or boys.

Then there is the 62-year-old conservative "businessman/rancher" from Montana who asked me if I "would be interested in a Sugar Dad type situation." Awww, sweet -- my first proposition. What could I possibly say, other than "Tell me more"? (Oh, don't judge me. I write a blog that trades on voyeurism, People.) He's looking for a girlfriend on the side he can "visit" every month when he comes to town. "Visit" is my polite euphemism for the word he really means. He elaborated that he likes to "visit" at least three times each night because he's "a Viagra Cowboy." I've been to enough rodeos to spot a Rodeo Clown right away. In so many words, I told him I never "visit" the Rodeo Clown. I only laugh at him.