Category: Dating

Inside the Mind of an Online Dater on a First Date

On By KathleenIn Dating, New York City2 Comments
The shoes a guy picks for a first date say a lot.

Okay. Here we go. I’m early. Should I text him? No, I’ll just wait. Well, what if he’s early too and already inside? I don’t want to be waiting out here like an asshole.

I’ll text him. Okay. done.

He’s running a little late. I’ll go inside. I hope they have bar snacks at this place. I haven’t eaten all day and I swear, I’ll eat my purse if they don’t have bar snacks and he’s much later.

Is my lipstick still on? God, I hate lipstick. Especially lipstick marks on my glass, from my own lips. Where’s my compact?

I hope he’s not shorter than me. He said he was 5’11, but that probably means he’s really 5’8, because if he was really 5’11 then he’d probably say he’s 6-foot. I mean, if I were 5’11, I’d say I was 6-foot. But then again, I’m 5’6 and I say I’m 5’5… but that’s because I’m a girl, and I wear heels. Technically, my height is adjustable. I don’t want to date a man who wears heels, I mean, this is not Louis XIV France. Then again, I like a man in cowboy boots and cowboy boots have heels.

I hope he’s not wearing cowboy boots. Unless he has a ranch. I don’t think he has a ranch. He’s from Brooklyn.

Okay, there he is. He’s walking right at me. He looks like he’s taller than me. Phew.

But I can’t make out his face. He was ruggedly handsome in his profile picture. Oh, no. His hairline –it’s not only receding, he’s practically bald.  Dammit! I should have known when he had hats on in EVERY SINGLE picture.

They’re always balding.

Always.

But hey! No big deal. Prince William’s going bald, and he’s still a catch. So let that one go.

What kind of shoes is he wearing? Remember that guy that wore the beat-up sneakers on the first date? The ones with the holes? What made him think that was a good idea?

He’s here.

Oh. Shit. He’s going in for the hug. Aim right!

Phew! He’s definitely taller than me. And he smells good. And those are nice shoes.

The bar didn’t have snacks. I probably shouldn’t order the bourbon. But I want a Manhattan. And, boy, am I gonna need it….

 

Friendly Persuasion, or an Ephinany about Online Dating

On By KathleenIn Dating3 Comments

“You know, I’d totally forgotten we’d met on OkCupid.”

So had I. The relationship we had forged over a handful of pleasant outings and months of texts and emails was so unlike anything that had come out of my foray into online dating, that I was convinced we had been introduced by old friends. Or better yet, that we were old friends.

My love life is more like a Woody Allen film than "The Notebook."

He confessed: “The truth is, I’m ambivalent about dating right now. I just want to find someone whose company I enjoy.”

We were standing chest to chest in the atrium of our favorite Museum. The lights were dim and for the most part, we were on our own. Had it been another couple and another night, the scene would have ended differently.

But my life is more like a Woody Allen film than a Nicholas Sparks-inspired Ryan Gosling flick — all the ambiance is there, but in the end, so are all the neuroses.

And all the greater life insights.

It's hard to find someone who will willingly spend an afternoon looking at Cindy Sherman portraits with you -- male or female.

Someone whose company I enjoy was all I was after too, and in the museum I was in the very enjoyable company of a new friend.

Up until this point, OkCupid had been a general disappointment. I shut down my profile. It’s not that I hadn’t met good-looking or smart or affable men. The problem, I came to understand, was the context in which we met.

Every online date had more or less followed the same course: hello hug, beverage consumption, laughter, good-night, kiss, let’s do this again soon. In between those mile markers the terrain varied, but generally I could expect to meet the same conversational obstacles — why did you sign up for OkCupid, what kind of relationship are you looking for, have you ever been in love.

“I don’t know what I’m looking for,” I remember saying once when I was on a date and, thanks to a drink, was feeling particularly candid.

“I believe in playing a relationship as it lays. Some begin and end as friendships. Some, as disasters. Maybe one as happily ever after. We’ll figure ‘us’ out as we go.”

The guy didn’t like my response very much. He was looking for a mother to his children. I couldn’t promise I was ready or willing to go minivan shopping with him. But we had met on an online dating site — a place people go with the expressed purpose of finding a romantic connection.

How could I say that we might only ever amount to friends?!?!

How could I say that we might never have sex!?!!?

how often does a match light on a first strike?

The problem with online dating is that it forces you to evaluate a person along a specific set of parameters — namely, do I want to get romantically involved with this person. Physical attraction and adherence to an idealized wish-list dominate. We sit across a table from someone waiting for a spark to fly. If there’s no spark, then we’re quick to dismiss the candidate.

But how often does a match light on a first strike?

Online dating hasn’t brought me a boyfriend. Someone might argue it’s been a failed experiment. But looking back, I’d say I beg to differ. Just don’t expect to find me transferring my account to match.com anytime soon.

When Ranting On Your Blog Doesn’t Turn You Into the Next Mark Zuckerberg

On By KathleenIn Bio Pics, Breakups, Dating, insights/observations4 Comments

Blogging is dangerous business. Originally, They Told Me to Find a Rich Husband was supposed to be anonymous. For a long time, even after I had given the “About” section a named authoress and a face, googling me wouldn’t get you to my blog. Somewhere along the way, probably thanks to Facebook, that changed. Now, anyone doing background on me will find TTM2FaRH front and center on the first page of search results.

Is this a problem?

Up until today, the answer would have been “no.” There’s nothing I’ve written that I would be ashamed to have a boss or family member read. A few boys doing their pre-date due-diligence have stumbled on this page — what they uncovered had never amounted to a strike against. Quite the contrary.

And that’s largely because I had adhered to a few simple rules: never be mean, never complain.

Boys behave badly, boys break your heart, but never make your blog about them. Keep it about you. Because sometimes, you behave badly. That’s more or less been my motto.

But I broke my rules. In a moment of frustration, I riddled off and published a post I shouldn’t have. For the first time, I made it solely about them. And it was mean-spirited. Thanks to google, it was found. I was rightly put in my place.

“One cannot be always laughing at a man without now and then stumbling upon something witty” — so wrote Jane Austen in Pride & Prejudice. Stumbling upon something witty is what TTM2FaRH hopes to do. Yet in the same book, her best loved hero, Mr. Darcy confesses: “I cannot forget the follies and vices of others so soon as I ought, nor their offenses against myself…My good opinion once lost is lost forever.”

The keyboard is mightier than the sword, and used recklessly, offers the Mr. Darcy’s of the world reasons enough to loose their good opinions.

There are enough blogs out there that ridicule men — Fail Males, for example.They Told Me to Find a Rich Husband will not be one of them.

 

An Essayist Fails to Find a Moral: or The Boy Broke My Heart and Taught me Nothing about Life. What a Jerk.

On By KathleenIn Bio Pics, Breakups, Dating1 Comment
An essayist breaks a cup. She writes an essay. She learns and shares a life lessonl. No pressure.

A personal essayist carries the weight of the world on her little writer’s shoulders.

She breaks a teacup.

She writes an essay about breaking the tea cup.

She turns introspective.

She employs wits.

She jerks at the heart’s strings.

She considers the social impact of breaking the teacup.

She turns a seemingly insignificant moment into a neatly resolved story with a moral and rounds it out with insightful commentary on the way we live now.

No pressure.

I like to think of myself an essayist, or perhaps an essayist in training. I’ve always believed that there is a story behind everything – and every story is interesting if you tell it right. There should never be a lack of inspiration, as long as you’re in the mood to be creative.

And there is certainly never a lack of inspiration when your favorite subject is the way we love now.

This is how I look when i'm trying to write an essay...

After several years in the trenches of Love’s War, I’ve decided every first date can provide preliminary material for a minimum of 3 essays. For each date thereafter, the number of possible papers increases exponentially.

As you stop counting singular dates and start measuring your relationship in real time frames (i.e., weeks, years), you can generate an endless number of moralizing assemblages of prose.

I’ve never had a problem finding a greater life lesson or an aha! moment of self-reflection in a first date… until Gary.

Gary came pre-approved with the Grimm’s Fairytale Stamp of Prince Charming Approval. He was everything I had ever designed for myself in the Simms World of dream mates. I was ready to fall in love with him. Fate dangled him in front of me just long enough for me to get my hopes up and then, it whoosed him away.

Sitting pen and paper in hand a few days later, I was at a loss. I find myself asking:

What was the fucking point of that one?

If I could have walked away having learned something worth sharing I would feel better about Gary’s intrusive foray into my dating life. Be a jerk, I say, but at least lead me to an “aha!” moment in the process!

Thus, instead of rising above the fray of emotion to bring this to a resolved closing remark, I end insight-less. Essayist major fail.

woof woof

Pass me the Lace & Dark Chocolate. I’ve Changed My Mind About Valentine’s Day

On By KathleenIn Bio Pics, Dating1 Comment
What are you doing on February 14th? Will You Be Mine?

“What are you doing on the 14th?” Brian asked. “Would you be our Valentine?”

When Brian says “our” he means him and his Cliff. And their housemate. It’s the best Valentine’s Day a gal could ask for. There will be great conversation. There might be candlelight. There will likely be pasta. I’ll definitely be wearing that lacy item I bought using my Victoria’s Secret gift card — but that’s for me, not for Brian, Cliff, or the housemate because sometimes a gal needs to feel a little femme fatale on night out… even if she’s the only one who notices.

In my elementary school youth, Valentine’s Day was one of my favorite holidays. Everyone would come into school bearing candy for every one of his or her classmates. At the end of the day, you would have as many “Will you be Mine?” notes as you had kids in your homeroom.

It was a holiday of equal opportunity love.

Then we developed hormones.

Tim Burton's drawing more or less summed up my feelings about V-Day. I had turned a little bitter

Eventually, I spent the days leading up to the holiday lingerie shopping with my girlfriends as they went to pick out that special something for their sweethearts or went bouquet-buying with my guy friends who didn’t know whether or not roses were too cliched. I had managed to dodge Cupid’s arrows, and so was best put to use playing Venus’s other little helper.

I grew a little bitter. “Valentine’s Day is a holiday developed by older married women to make younger single women feel inadequate” –> this is something I apparently wrote in a notebook one year. I think it might have been one of those many years when the guy I liked decided to take my roommate/best friend/someone else out for Valentine’s Day instead of me.

This box of victorian-style collage valentines, by Punch Studio, change my mind about Valentine's Day

Last year, I found a box of Victorian-style Valentines at a bookstore. They appealed to my inner history nerd and so I bought them. It was time to drop the bitter single girl act that had plagued my late teens and early twenties and to return to being that youthful innocent who loved that Valentine’s Day was an excuse to wear excessive quantities of pink lace, an excuse to eat lots of chocolate, an excuse to tell people you care about that you care about them.

And so each of my friends received a vintage Valentine in their mailbox, complete with a LOVE stamp.

I don’t have a Valentine in the traditional sense this year, but I’m content. I have good friends, a box of Valentines that need to be postmarked, dark chocolate, and that something lacy for that someone special — myself.

What Superbowl XLVI Revealed About my Relationship History

On By KathleenIn Bio Pics, Dating2 Comments
I'm armed with my Giants t-shirt. Too bad my date rooted for the Patriots.

Who would have thought a Superbowl Game could reveal so much about my romantic history? Gearing up for this weekend’s New York-New England showdown put me face-to-face with a startling trend in my dating habits.  Apparently, there’s a part of me that’s a masochist, because as I look down the timeline of relationships and dates past, all this Yankee sees is a string of New Englanders in their Red Sox caps and Patriots jerseys.

I was still carrying the bag housing my freshly-purchased Giants t-shirt when I met Robert for drinks. Robert and I seemed a nice fit. Putting aside his boyish good looks, he was an artist and environmentalist, and for both of these I have a particular soft spot. But then the trouble begins. Robert is a Rhode Island born, Vermont educated Patriots fan. I am a Giants fan (newly-minted, albeit, but still a fan), and when our discussion turned to the pending Superbowl, we both started to get prickly.

It's a modern day, sports world Romeo and Juliet. If they can make it work, why can't I?

The story of Romeo & Juliet is one of the most over romanticized in the history of English literature, and yet I find myself destined to play the part of the New York Montague consistently attracted to a New England Capulet.

That boy my senior year of high school. My first love in college. The last 4 guys I’ve been on at least one date with. Red Sox fan after Patrios fan after Bruins fan after Harvard alum. It’s my tragic flaw – I always seem to fall hardest for men who root for my teams’ arch-rivals.

I blame New York men, mostly, for this. If New Yorkers canoed more, if they were more transcendental, if they had served time on turkey farms  in their youth, I might find it easier to fall for one of my own men in pinstripes. But there’s something about that rugged New Englander with a well-worn copy of Walden in his back pocket and a knack for layering sweaters that I find totally irresistible.

Given my type, this may very well have to be my wedding cake.

Luckily, Robert hates baseball, so if anything comes of this, I won’t wake up to find my Jeter t-shirt slashed to bits or my traveling Yankee gnome beheaded.

Back in 2008, when my MA thesis advisor recommended I apply to Harvard for my doctorate, I practically spat at her:

“I’m a New Yorker! I can’t live in a city that roots for the Red Sox.”

In the wake of Superbowl 2012 and what it reveals about my dating history, it occurred to me that this may have been a foolish display of stubbornness. In December, I’ll be applying again for PhD programs. I suppose I’d better apply to some Boston schools, because apparently this pinstriped Juliet is in the wrong city to find her Romeo.