Back to square one. A dinner date with a girl named Anastasia was my first foray into the terrifying world that is online dating. After hearing about the failures that were my steamy work affair and the too-young MWS, she promptly offered me a solution: OkCupid. This is a free dating site for 20-somethings similar to eHarmony or Match.com. At this stage in my journey, I had NEVER even thought of online dating, not that I looked down upon it, the thought just never presented itself in my day to day life. I knew a few girls who had used it in London, and they had moderate success, still the idea seemed very foreign to me. I thought that people would just judge me on my pictures and I felt really awkward writing about myself, with the intent of seducing someone with my personality? This is too weird.
Anastasia was quite forceful, she immediately commandeered my laptop and began setting up my profile. She wrote these completely ridiculous, drawn-out, lengthy paragraphs describing me, which were not in my voice at all. But I was a good sport and went along with it. Anastasia is this real take-charge kind of girl, and the second she senses a project, she moves in full steam ahead. She not only made my profile, but started "liking" guys for me, and writing them these equally ridiculous messages full of things I would never say. She was very clear with me, you will only get out of this what you put into it, she said to me. Meaning that I would need to log hours reading and re-reading people's profiles, trying to eek out some semblance of attraction or interest. It was fun at first, but then felt like a lot of work with little to no result.
A week or so later, I went on my first and only OkCupid date. His name was Henning and he was German. His pictures were cute enough, although he looked different in every one, a huge red flag in the online dating world. We had a few flirty emails back and forth, before we exchanged phone numbers and began texting. When he asked to meet, I suggested the cafe/bar by my work, where I could make a quick getaway if needed. Turns out it was needed, badly.
We greeted each other and sat down at the bar, I ordered my favorite drink, and when the server turned to him, he ordered water. Just. water. What? The server, who knows me, looked at me quizzically. He confessed, "Oh, by the way, I don't drink." I thought to myself, then why hell did you meet me at a bar? He said that he "partied too hard in college" and was sober now. Which is fine, more power to you. However as the lovely bestie CE said when I asked her if I could date someone who didn't drink, she looked me and rattled off three major points off on her fingers. Brunch, Napa, wedding toast. Three activities a sober partner could not partake in. No thank you.
It wasn't just that he didn't drink. After ordering his water, he launched into a speech about how the CalTrain unions were going to be the downfall of our society. I'm all for discussing politics, but never on the first date, and not if you're a weird communist. I pretty much gulped down my drink, made up an excuse about needing to get back to work, and high-tailed it outta there. The entire date lasted maybe 20 minutes.
I deleted my account the next day. Not because of weird German guy, but because I just wasn't feeling it. I conversed electronically with a few other guys, some I liked, some I didn't. But I never met another guy from OKC again. I just could never get the hang of reading through all the stuff. Which is why I switched to Tinder, but more on that later :)
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