Love, Jimmie

Women’s biggest fear in online dating is that they will be harmed in some way, that they aren’t safe. Men’s biggest fear in online dating is that their date will be fat.

~astute observation made by someone whose name I cannot recall

In the interest of fairness regarding Wednesday’s post, my last bout of online dating resulted in dates with five very nice gentlemen. It didn’t seem that any of them cared about my fat although one of them did dump me right after he asked for a second date.  It was my favorite way to get dumped, though!  He explained that he had a great time, that he wanted to do it again, and asked if he was tall enough for me.  I enthusiastically replied with all positive answers and then a few days later when I texted him, he wrote back, “Oh.  Hey, girl.”

If ever I find myself on the dumpee end of a budding one-date relationship, I’m using that! “Oh. Hey, dude”.  Effective, ain’t it?

Y’all, I don’t even know why I thought I wanted to date men right now. I feel like I’m an amazing person, not in an ego way, but in the way that I’ve worked hard to have a nice life, a good attitude, joy, and peace. That makes me pretty special, at least to me, because I’m as close to the person I want to be as I’ll ever get. Then something gets squirrely and I find myself hopeful with a dash of wild hair and hop online to peruse my selections, like in a grocery store aisle.  Most of what I see is a huge disappointment.  I mean, I’m always going to select Vlasic pickles over some generic wimpy-looking pickle, but at least in Kroger there are entire shelves devoted to the many variants of the Vlasic pickle and I can make my selections accordingly. In Nashville, the men selections are becoming increasingly the same, the wimpy-looking generic pickle, and those generic pickles are a pretty pathetic substitute for my really nice life full of joy and peace and contentment.

I’d like to paint a picture for those of you who have never online dated but are curious about it. I feel like doing some quick math here will demonstrate my point.

Conservatively speaking, I’ve swiped either yes or no on about 1,000 men. I’d say that 88.2% of those men’s profiles said one (not more) of the following:

• *crickets*
• I’m just me.
• If you want to know anything, just ask.
• I’m fluent in sarcasm.
• I work hard and play hard.
• I’m looking for my partner in crime.
• Oh, and add five years to my age.
• Facebook made my age younger than it really is and I can’t change it.
• Looking for spontaneous and adventurous (note: this means hookup).

You are probably thinking, “I see nothing inherently wrong with any of those sentences.” I would agree except our reasonable math here will explain my dilemma.  88.2% of that 1,000 equals  882 men, which leaves 118 men who did not type out one of the above phrases.  Or non-phrases if we are being picky.  When you read the same phrases 882 times, you begin to see a pattern, and I’d venture to say it becomes tiresome after reading it the first 200 times.

Now, of those 1,000 men, roughly 60% of them are in Nashville to pursue some kind of career in music, or if not career, then at least fame. That means that they post country music rock star pictures of themselves on a mountain with their thumbs hooked in the pockets of their tight Buckle jeans and wearing hemp choker necklaces, usually with a hat of some sort pulled low over their eyes which are looking pensively off into the distance.  Actually, that’s picture one. Picture two involves the instrument or mic of their choice and also usually involves someone’s arm in the right-hand corner raised up with a lighter.  The amount of fame increases the amount of arms.  Note I said fame, not skill.  To continue our math, and to make it easy, let’s say that of those 118 men left who wrote more than one original complete sentence, 60% of them are pursuing some sort of music fame.  That is 71 men.

It is relevant to note here that I will never date a musician. I have a thousand reasons for that, not least of which is the significant other is so far down on the priority list, after fame and fans and instruments, and groupies, and roadies and so on, that there might as well not be a significant other.  So my pool of potentials now drops from 118 to 47.

Going back to our original numbers, I’d guess that 30% of the men online are either A) married (you can tell by the lack of photos or the lack of non-dog pictures) or B) in a polyamory relationship (most of them say their wives are okay with it, but call me skeptical.) I, for one, don’t share.  No thanks.  So using our math skillz, let’s say 30% of the remaining 47 men are not available for a single monogamous relationship.  That leaves us with 33 men.

Now we must factor out my dealbreakers:

• If I can’t see your eyes, I swipe no
• If your name is Fred, I swipe no
• If you have used every available filter readily available to you so that all of your pictures have BEER THIRTY emblazoned on the bottom, I swipe no
• If you are an atheist, I swipe no
• If you say your children are your entire world, I swipe no because clearly there is no room for anyone else in your life
• If you say that at 50 you are hopeful to still start a family, I swipe no

I forgot to add in the scammers, all of which claim to be military men who have been stationed in a foreign country, because everyone knows that all lonely, sad, single women are patriots who cannot wait to send their money to the Nicaraguan claiming to be Army in Lebanon. For the sake of easy math, let’s combine them in with all of the above and give that group a conservative percentage of 20.  That leaves me with 27 men from whom I can make my pickle selections, and 20 of them are terrified that their dates will be fat.  So I got seven, five of whom I had at least one date with.  And of those five, I am terribly afraid to report that not one of them is my person for one reason or another.  Every single one of them lovely, a Claussen at the very least, but not mine.  And typical for my experiences with online dating.

The funny part of me wants to say, “I’ll just move to Alaska where there are .2 women for every 100 men and I’ll be wildly popular!” But the real part of me wants to say, “You know what? I’m okay.  I’m happy.  I’ve worked hard to be this person and I like her. I like her friends.  I like her family, and mostly I like her life.  So thanks, generic pickle, but I’ll wait on my Vlasic because a squishy wimpy soggy pickle is no substitute for the real thing, and honestly, I’m pretty happy with this bowl of olives that is my current life right here in front of me that includes no pickle at all.”