How to Disappoint Yourself
Re: Intimate Relationships
If you call yourself an adult, we’ve all been there before, right?
It starts by someone being nice to you, having a conversation. They’re curious about you and show interest in the things you like to talk about. They take note. You’re pleasantly surprised to find out that you have lots of things in common, quirky things even, awww lookit us. Fuckin adorable. Now there’s some inside jokes hehe haha.
Before you know it, five hours has passed in the blink of an eye. You’re both hungry and dehydrated but you don’t feel any of that because of the sheer exhilaration. Isn’t this what a connection is? A real one? You study their features, finding more and more things you like and find attractive.
You can be 16 doing this, you can be 45, shit, you can be 95. You can have never been in a serious relationship before, ever, or be divorced for the past 6 years - with or without kids, with or without a mortgage, with or without a shameful moving back in with family. You can be a widow/er. You might have picked up and moved to a completely alien place. The point is, you never really quite learn your lesson because people, human beings, are ultimately social creatures despite the increasingly common subscription to Introversion and Peace Finding.
From a woman’s perspective, you are groomed since birth for (probably) patriarchal standards - beauty, work, family. The concepts of Marriage and Motherhood and Love are mashed into your eye sockets and jammed down your throat and dumped onto your head. Smile more! Be pretty and quiet and useful. Prove you’re worthy. Make this your goal. These are the only things that matter. Of course you want that! Everyone wants that! That is the perfect life!
Then you get a little older and the fairy tale dissolves in a string of shitty dating experiences and you swear off of men, somehow the objects of your natural attraction and also your apex predator. You learn some hard lessons about what it means to be on the other side of the Marriage/Motherhood/Love scam. Maybe you’re still stuck in it because you don’t have the financial independence to go anywhere else but you certainly don’t buy into the bullshit anymore. For the first time, you’re finally building yourself up for no other reason than you never have before and the constant diminishment of You has led to a life where, for all intents and purposes, You do not exist. Your identity only exists in the context of someone else. Well, no more. Right? You are more than So-and-so’s mom, you are more than Mrs. Blah Blah.
Therapy happens. +/- medication. Maybe it’s mindfulness and crafting. It’s silent retreats in the woods with soundbathing. It’s solo travel, it’s running clubs, it’s interpretive dance lessons at the Y. It’s cleanses and supplements. There’s gyms and salsa nights. There’s generally a lot of support from other women because that’s the only place it would come from and unfortunately, not always the ones closest to you. But okay, you’ve brushed yourself off, assessed the damage, patched up what you can, hauled yourself upright, strapped the remains of whatever baggage you have left onto your back, and started off again - quick march.
Perhaps you’ve come to a good place, no, a great place. You can’t remember the last time you’ve been so fulfilled, content, at peace. You do Pilates now and have a kickin revenge body. You have slow mornings in your sun-drenched kitchen, there’s plants inside or out, potentially a cat. Your space is gorgeous because you take care of it and you keep it clean and you fill it with things that bring you joy. You also KEEP OUT things that might fuck all that up. You might actually be aging in reverse at this point. You’ve figured it all out, you’ve survived, and now you thrive.
So maybe you push yourself to go out more. Meet new people. Make new friends. These apps are free to download and use. Oh, the swiping is strangely addictive but you’re not indiscriminate. Noo, after the hard battles you’ve won, you read quite carefully. You analyze photos and traits on display and bios. Only the worthy shall pass, right?
Let’s look at it from a filtering POV. When you enter the arena, you have to supply parameters - logistical things really - to get things kicked off. Let’s say conservatively that there are 6 million users on our hypothetical dating app, Meet Cute. You limit your search to men because unfortunately, it is in fact the horrible truth that we can’t choose our sexual preferences (sigh) so that eliminates women from the pool. Let’s call it a 50/50 split which leaves 3 million users. Now you narrow based on a respectable age range - 1 million, smoker/drinker vs non - 800K, un/vaccinated - 600K, worldview - 100K, sundry other details (education, seeking a similar relationship type, +/- kids, star sign, blah blah blah) - 6K, and finally those users within 50 km of your geographic location - 1K. Now the algorithm begins churning out candidates for you to look through, using AI to display the “most attractive” prospects first.
Aaaaaand here we go:
No name
No bio
Only group photos
No actual photo
Photos with fish
Photos with guns
Headless, shirtless pic
Photos with mask, sunglasses, looking away, tiny person/giant background, filters, hats
ENM, “we are seeking a third”, open relationship
Entire bio is a red pill rant of massive red flags
“Just ask”
Waaaaay outside of your age range
Waaaaaaay outside of 50km radius
Cat fish, AI, actual celebrity photos but from places you wouldn’t recognize them from ie - scammers
Smudged with who knows what, night, through a window, through a windshield
If you’re still keeping track, we are down to something like 150 or so users and they are getting uglier by the swipe.
Oh, wait. He’s cute. Has several photos that look recent. Age apropos. Bio isn’t alarming. Looking for the same Respectable Situationship you are. [swipes right]
“It’s a match!”
Maybe you’ve swiped right something like… 20 times. You’ve matched algorithmically 10. Now comes the messaging phase.
Nothing - literally no message or an unmatch
Hey/Hi
Something immediately gross/creepy/dick pic
3 matches left.
Conversation with the remainder becomes the goddamn Hunger Games.
One stretches over 3 weeks and is so goddamn boring, you black out. He has clearly not read your profile and brings up all manner of stupid shit to indicate this fact. He is not funny. He is not original. He barely asks you questions.
One messages you back fairly quickly. He is actually right on top of your messages. It’s….a lot. He wants your number. He wants to meet tomorrow, the next day? The day after? Whenever you’re available. He cancels the day of. He cancels the resched. His messages get sparse, clipped. He hits you up at 8:47 pm to “see if you’re around”.
The very last guy doesn’t message much but has actually read your profile and draws on information from previous messages. He apologizes for being busy. There’s some banter, jokes, mutual grievances over “life”. He asks you to coffee. When you meet, he looks like his photos, he’s wearing a button up shirt, there’s product in his hair. You find common ground as you get to know one another. You ask each other insightful questions. The coffee shop is closing “suddenly”. He sees you on your way and gives you a hug.
You spend the rest of the night trying to calm your ass down and stop replaying every bit of the conversation you’ve just had. You pick at his appearance, his responses. You go back into the app to read his profile with laser focus and the messages you’ve exchanged thus far. Now is the hour for telling yourself this is no Special Thing and Not What Either of You Are Looking For and It Was Just Coffee and agony agony agony.
Because no matter what you’ve been through and how many failures and so much growth and healing, and the sweet, sweet taste of blissful peace that comes with the solo woman’s life, I still have not managed to get over the devastating Hope of Making a Real Connection.
