Make Me A Match

            I do not condone torture.  However, if I were to meet the guy or gal that invented the online dating service, Guantanamo Bay would look like a time share on Fire Island.  After a few months of hitting the internet chat rooms and other virtual meeting halls for sex-deprived gay men, it was inevitable that I try the G-rated version.  Match.com. Obviously, mucho dollars are spent on advertising for these sites, and they take great pains to coax the lonely and needy into a world where everyone meets their Prince Charming or Sleeping Beauty.  So color me lonely and needy, because I bought into it and excitedly signed up. 

After I paid the hefty admission ticket to enter for three months, I was asked to create an online profile and answer a dazzling array of questions.  I hadn’t been that excited since filling out my senior book in high school.  Ten pages where I got to talk about ME!  My physical features, my favorite vacation spots, hobbies, future plans, favorite food and drink.  Like Christmas for the emotionally unfulfilled.  So I sat down and went to work.  I butched up parts of it in case a baseball fan wanted to take me to a Yankees game.  I toned down my love of show tunes for fear of stereotype.  I could be any person I wanted.  In hindsight, I should have settled for being me.

When it came time to search for my new husband, I was like the proverbial kid in a candy store.  I “winked” at or emailed practically every hunk on the site.  Each email was custom-made for each prospective beau.  When finished, I reviewed the emails and was quite proud of my witty repartee and intelligent anecdotes.  Funny how three glasses of Merlot can make the most mundane of sentences sparkle.  I went to bed that night tipsy and satisfied.  Satisfied, knowing that the next day my mailbox would be chock full of suitors.  It’s horrifying how wrong a human being can sometimes be.

The next morning I went about my day, going to my loathsome job at a downtown Manhattan bank, kowtowing to my uneducated boss, and hitting the gym with a semi-gusto.  I practically skipped home, overflowing with excitement and confidence that soon I would marry.  There were several responses in my mailbox, all unsolicited.  I was crushed.  No one that I reached out for reached back.  I couldn’t understand this.  I was so methodical in my choosing.  If the guy was hot, then he got an email.  Wait. Maybe I should have actually read their profiles.  Looked for similarities and differences.  Suddenly, clarity.  Despite all of their hard work trying to convince us otherwise, the internet dating world is just like the real world, only with emoticons.  Guys that aren’t interested in me in 3-D aren’t interested in my picture/profile combination either.  And the guys that follow me down Eighth Avenue in Chelsea unsolicited will also follow me down the virtual dating highway as well.

So I sifted through the junk.  I reluctantly set up a couple of dates, one of whom paid for dinner.  He turned out to be a nice guy.  A copywriter who accidentally almost form-tackled Katharine Hepburn on a busy Manhattan sidewalk years before. He offered to take me to a Yankees game—being I love baseball—but when I offered just my cheek for a goodnight kiss, that was the last I heard from him.  I retreated to lick my wounds which entailed several glasses of wine and a one-night stand to make me feel worthy.  After getting an unhealthy dose of faux self-worth, I hit it again.  This time I was more realistic about my wants and needs and tried to look for men who were more willing to reciprocate.  The new formula worked.  I started getting some responses from guys who I really wanted to follow me down Eighth Avenue.  At first. 

I accepted a date with John.  A cutie with wavy brown hair.  A buyer at Bergdorf-Goodman.  I met him at the mother ship of gay bars, G.  I was standing at the bar, nervously looking around for my date.  John tapped me on the shoulder, and I was pleasantly surprised.  He looked just like his picture.  I breathed a silent sigh of relief, and his facial expression told me that he did the same.  He bought two drinks, and we headed for a table.  I noticed his oversized man-purse.

“I like your bag,” I offered.

“Thanks,” he dramatically sighed.  “Fifteen hundred dollars.”

I almost swallowed my tongue.

“Really?  My entire outfit costs barely over a hundred.”

“Oh, how could that be?”

Easy.  I went on to explain how the jeans came from a really cool thrift store, my nice fitted shirt came from Century 21, and my new boots were on sale.  He looked at me in disbelief.

“That is so funny,” he went on.  “These jeans alone cost almost a thousand dollars.”

The night proceeded in just this fashion.  Everything had a price tag.  And not only did he tell me how much he paid for his clothes, his house, and every stick of furniture in it, but he also told me how much he made and the huge amount of his recent bonus.  And here I was.  Working for a shitty commercial bank using credit cards almost to their limit and shopping at thrift stores.  If the constant bragging wasn’t enough, each time he told me how much something cost, he dramatically rolled his eyes and looked so put upon as if to say “I stitched every last thread of these jeans” or “I laid every brick of my house.”  I was secretly plotting excuses to get out of going to dinner with him.  Turned out I didn’t need to.  Our income disparity and my obvious disgust were enough.  He didn’t ask.  Instead, he paid the check, and we headed home.  Separately. 

Still stinging from John and his gold-dusted jeans, I reluctantly kept a date with Stan, a date that I had agreed to go on the week before.  So three nights after my lesson in the economics of dating, I met Stan at Gym, a gay sports bar—which I’ve learned is not an oxymoron.  We were to have a couple of beers and then head to dinner at an Italian restaurant.  I walked in, saw him, and we both smiled.  Again, he looked like his picture.  Tall and handsome.  A blue-collar look.  Like he could pour cement or something.  We introduced ourselves, and he bought two beers and turned to me.

“So like I said I’m Stan originally from the Midwest but I would never claim that to anyone HA HA HA HA HA HA no kidding I love the Midwest it’s so provincial and pure and my parents are still there who I adore and my siblings and their kids who I just love do you love kids? I LOVE kids I want three do you want kids?  It would be so neat if you took my last name and then we could name our son Henry!  How much fun would that be?  I love my job I’m a contractor and am so busy all the time and can never find time for a relationship but you’re too cute to pass up and you seem so interesting and fun and cool so what do you say?”

My eyes crossed. 

“I beg your—“

“What do you say about going steady?”

I downed my beer, put five dollars on the bar, and walked out.

“Well, you seem too wound up to have kids anyway!” he called out behind me.

Two weeks later, having given up Match.com for good, I got a message in my inbox.  I didn’t even look at his profile and picture.  I wasn’t interested.  Until I read his email.  No talk of walking on the beach or income level or how many children we were going to have.  Just simple and direct.

“Fuck this match.com bullshit. Do you want to go out to dinner with me?”

I met him for dinner the next night.  He was already seated when I arrived.  He stood up as I approached the table.  Well over 6’4”, he had the kind of smile that made my stomach flip.  Firm in all the right places with a little bit of gut.  Classic features with just a hint of flaw.  I said a silent prayer and sat down.  His name was Doug.  He was a successful visual arts designer from California who had only been in New York for two years.  Conversation was easy.  We talked about our likes and dislikes, the perils of online dating, and our respective horror stories.  Dinner and drinks turned into a three hour date.  I felt like I had known him for a lot longer.  He had exquisite taste in wine and was well-versed in just about everything, including theatre which I love.  Even his flaws were cute. 

“Do you want to go see a play sometime?” I asked.

“Um, yeah.  But I get kind of anxious when I’m boxed in with a lot of people, so I may need to sit on the aisle.  I actually had to get up and leave ‘Mamma Mia’ last month.”

“Well, that probably didn’t have so much to do with your social anxiety as it did with ‘Mamma Mia’,” I offered. 

At the end of the night, he wanted to walk me home.  Walk me home!  I couldn’t believe it.  We got to my front door, and he kissed me.

“This has been the best date.  I really want to see you again.  I haven’t met anyone in a long time that really grabbed me like you did,” he said.

This was it.  My last blind date.  I just knew it.  We made plans for the next week.

“Next time when I walk you home, I’ll come up,” he grinned.

I watched him walk away.  I was happy.  Content.  Smitten. 

I got an email from him two days later.

“You’re a fantastic guy and a great catch.  But dating is just not where I am right now.  Take care, Doug.”

Just like his first email.  Simple.  And direct.