Preface
Picture it: The year is 2008, location - Lansing, MI.
I was two months post break-up when my sister mentioned the possibility of a blind date. I probably shouldn’t have been surprised since that same sister (my only sister) also suggested, on the day of my break-up with my boyfriend of 2 years, that I begin online dating in a month. True story.
Ready? Set? Wait! Problem! Where the hell was I going to meet someone? No bars, please! Work wasn’t looking promising. And although my church was great for inspirational music and sermons, a booming dating ground, it was not. Online dating, it shall be. Although it wasn’t completely uncharted territory, several years had passed since my initial online dating attempt and I was in a much different place. The first time it was more for the social aspect, someone to spend time with, have fun with, blah, blah, blah. This time, at 27 – I was sure my eggs were starting to rot – I was no longer looking for a casual date, this was considered a full-on search for my future husband and baby daddy. When I first began this quest I rationalized $39.95 was more than reasonable for a husband, after my fourth (or was it fifth? certainly not sixth!) 3 month subscription – it was adding up; my ROI wasn’t looking good. But to fully understand, we’ll need to start at the beginning.
The Profile
I groaned and sat down at my computer, I knew the drill and would venture to guess most on-line daters have tried more than one (if not several different) site(s). Depending on the site the sign-up protocol and process vary, but one thing is consistent – creating your profile. This is a stressful and complicated task which usually involves heavy use of the Backspace key as well as phone calls to several different relatives/friends to grill them on how they would describe me, identifying my best qualities, and of course – to have them look at a zillion different pictures to tell me which ones will do the trick to draw the interest of my future husband. After I had exhausted my options and gathered feedback, there was only one thing left. I hung up the phone – stared at the blank, taunting boxes and began to type.
Oh the pressure that comes with making the profile. I am funny! Right? So I want to come across as funny. But not too funny, I want them to know I am very serious about this quest to find my future spouse. I certainly can’t be too serious – ixnay on the wedding song suggestions, pictures of potential center pieces or wedding dresses-ay.
Crap – pictures. This is going to take longer than I thought. (Not to mention it’s going to be waaay more painful than I thought.) Which ones should I use? I grabbed my phone thinking I would probably need to schedule a faux photo shoot with my sister to get something suitable. You know the one – where your stand-in photographer comes over, you do your hair, make-up, and pick your outfit(s) for the sole purpose of taking profile pictures. Ok, dressed to impress and ready to smile. Now it's time to pose in the most believable un-posed way possible. The pressure starts to mount – you‘re afraid you are going to begin sweating. And then you gasp when you realize you ARE sweating. Oh – that’s just great. Real impressive. Just what every guy wants – a page full of sweaty girl pictures, that‘s going to have them lining up.
OK – deep breath. There has to be some relatively recent pictures I can post. There is that cute one of me and my friends on girls’ night – but do I really want to be buried in a group? And what if my potential suitor thinks one of my girl friends (who are all much thinner) are cuter than me. Well, how about a picture of me and my niece or my best friend’s twins. Wait, I don’t want to give the false impression that I have children. But then again, what if I did?! What’s wrong with that? I certainly don’t want a guy who is anti-kids. Decision made – pictures with kids are just fine. As far as the girls, I can crop them out – no harm done.
Making progress – the About Me section is complete. Hopefully well balanced text that screams “I’m funny yet serious, wife material after an appropriate amount of time, and a hell of a catch”. Now on to the About My Date section. Ohhh, this one is tricky. I don’t want to be too picky and come across as superficial, but I have standards, damn it. They aren’t particularly high and seem to be getting lower with every bad (or even sub-par) date, but I still have them. There is a picture in my head of what my significant other might look like – give or take a few features. Ideally he is taller than me, coming in at a modest 5‘6, it wasn‘t a huge stretch. At the very least he is tall enough for the Cedar Point rides, but doesn’t stand eye to eye with the guy on stilts at the fair. He is more than 100 lbs, as I don’t want to break the poor man, and I am, shall we say… healthy. I’d prefer less than 400 pounds, because being mobile is pretty high up in my book. And then there’s the age factor – he needs to be of legal age to drink but preferably not an AARP subscriber and is not able to take advantage of McDonald’s senior discount. That’s okay, right?! Back to having standards. Oh boy, the pressure of expressing what you want without offending the midget grandfather confined to his bed. And I thought the picture dilemma was making me sweat.
OK – save and submit for approval. Blast Off! I stood up from my computer, stretched - and smiled, relatively happy with the finished product. I was ready to relax and wait for the winks to flood in.
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