Luckily for you, I am a masochist with love for small talk over alcoholic beverages

I both love and hate universally those other souls in this online dating subculture I’ve joined. In the vein of Climbing Mt. Everest or taking a Polar Bear plunge, I respect us for our headlong pursuit into the masochistic abyss. The courage we employ in our shameless pursuit of happiness is not to be scoffed at, for there is no more vulnerable social activity than that of the blind date. Compounded with the attendant stigmas associated with online dating, we put ourselves casually on the line, in just such a manner, in no other social context. For that, I feel a sense of kinship with these people. My people.

To be honest, I detect in myself traces of contempt for us all as well. I assume nothing flattering about anyone’s motivations for using an Internet dating site to meet people. I bear a pervading guilty-of-loser-ness-until-proven-innocent stance for everyone I encounter in this world. So amongst the criteria I use to implicitly evaluate profiles are the person’s motivations for being there. I myself do not know what mine are. I said it was for the creation of this blog, but time and again I’ve been criticized for my failure to adequately document my experiences.

So for what purpose have I found myself on three dates this week? Was I having fun? Am I eager to go on another date any time soon? Did you the reader get anything sufficient out of my sacrifice?

After sharing an unfortunate anecdote with a friend, he encouraged me to address the topic here with my readers. To make my suffering worthwhile, I have agreed.

After a date with a gentleman earlier this week went not too terribly, it ended with categorically un-fun kissing, which I ended due to its failure to inspire. Rather than cutting his losses and going our separate ways, said date was very rudely defensive with me the next day, framing me as sociopath, and demanding a full explanation. Though I could in good spirit offer no more of an explanation except to say it felt kind of like this:


...he would not buy lack of chemistry as an excuse and pursued the matter incessantly via instant messaging and a series of emails ranging from outbursts, to apologies for outbursts, over the course of 36 hours. While I am not a sociopath, and profusely apologized for the sequence of events that left him feeling self-conscious and hurt, I was affronted by his lack of self-respect and wished nothing more than for him to drop the matter.

After this experience, I was weary, and again ready to quit this blog for a hazard-free one that involves cooking all of Rachel Ray's 30 minute recipes, but I had a bagel date lined up for the next day, which renewed my passion for meeting strangers on the Internet.