Sorting the Muscles from the Brussels
After all the talk and posturing and procrastinating and excuses, I finally did it. I’ve spent the past month back on a certain dating website which has brought me some success in the past. Though clearly not the ultimate success it claims to be capable of or I wouldn’t be back there.
I ran out of excuses when they started emailing me offering me a 1 month subscription for just £4.99 (that’s about $6.50). Initially this seemed like an excellent deal, but it dawned on me soon after signing up that it was possible even dating websites felt sorry for my nearly-in-my-40s single status. Hmmm.
It’s funny (or perhaps frighteningly sad) that the site was full of familiar faces. That isn’t to say that I have lots of single male friends who are also signed up, but rather there are people on the site who I chatted to or had dates with when I first delved into the mire of online dating in 2012. That’s 5 years ago! In fact, it’s 5½ years ago and these people are still on there! Hardly an advert for the site’s success rate! In fact, it’s actually a fairly depressing outlook… If I’m still writing about being single in 5 years’ time, please just send me to Dignitas. It’ll be the kinder option.
Until then, there’s the website. And as well as the old (in many senses of the word) familiar faces there’s new blood touting their wares too. I can’t lie. My initial reticence and grumpy teenager attitude at being back online quickly dissipated and was replaced by flutters of excitement as messages and compliments arrived in my inbox. Yes, alright, I’m very capable of being shallow when it suits me. A few, “Wow, you’re beautiful!”s in my inbox and suddenly being back in the dating game doesn’t seem so terrible after all.
But then the difficult part starts, and I start banging my head against a brick wall. I refuse to respond to messages which just say, “Hi!” or “Want to chat?” It was a painstaking process writing my 2000 character profile, and I made sure I darn well used every character available. If you’re interested in what it has to say, then at least make the effort to pick up on something, or share some detail of your own. If you’ve bothered to note that I love brussel-sprout sandwiches (it’s important to get the weird stuff out in the open straight away I find…) then use it to make a connection.
Oh, and don’t respond to someone who makes a point of saying they love accurate grammar and spelling with, “i fink ur gr8.” Take the hint from the profile please.
And what is it with men taking photographs of themselves in a bathroom? It’s not a great message people. Don’t you know which button to press to flip the camera view on your phone? You can forget the topless muscle-flexing shots too. And the suggestive, “I’m in my bed, won’t you join me?” ones. Ugh. No, no I won’t thank you very much.
I guess going back online has at least helped me to understand why I’m single, if nothing else… now, where’s that brussel-sprout sandwich?
