What is our current widespread sexual problem? How can we best resolve it? See eight ways, and why it would be beneficial for tens of millions of Americans, at http://worksnewage.blogspot.com/2018/08/for-free-thinkers-only-americas-sexual_17.html.
Some people look to others to broaden them. I've always looked within. And I don't find the author's acquired new talents engaging. Sounds like she bores easily. This is the writer's curse. Nothing's ever as good as what you imagine.
17
I think Jason in Bayside makes an interesting point. The author does not appear to be a man hater, but she does use them as cannon fodder for her writing career. I hope the names are not real, but her descriptions, especially of the boat builder, could enable people who know them to identify these men. If a man wrote such an article, the NYT would probably not publish it; if they somehow did, the Twitter mob would call for him to be sent into publishing Siberia. I guess the moral of the story for both sexes is never date a writer unless you don't mind having your personal life published to further the writers career. It makes me wonder if the women in Hemingway's books knew he was going to write about them.
15
Online dating is the kind of thing that you just take a big risk doing, will you find the love of your life, or will you be left on the side of the road? heck, you might even get murdered, its a coin flip. But regardless of the risks it's exciting to me nonetheless. There are so many races and religions, tribes and traditions out in the world, this gives you the chance to hear and experience these thing through another human being that you may just like, I love it! Dating online also allows people with no social life, like myself, to find those specific people they think they can get along with and get growth out of it, it's really helpful. And another thing is, that other person most likely is also just and excited and curious as you. now, you could find that one out there on the first try, or you won't, but that should not stop you, as there are many fish in the virtual sea of 1s and 0s, villain and heroes.
7
Had a few initial dates lately. Ghost city. Memo to file: Don’t buy dinner. Tinder chicks are looking of free meals.
5
this article made me sad, no judgment but it just seems like such a soul-less way to live, w an underlying meme of drugs, alcohol and random sex coloring the interactions, not genuine curiosity or empathy for the people she's interacting w, just an ant-eater-like quest for the next distraction.
21
This article struck me as an attempt by the author to stoke attention in the right quarters for her online dating “odyssey.” Online dating is the new normal. By comparison, the experiences Candace Bushnell wrote about seem almost quaint. Does this writer hope to leverage her (retrospectively) fond recollections of “the best of” those 86 dates into a one-off Hollywood dramedy? Move over, Julie Powell. Your roadmap "365 days, 524 recipes" is one that others will follow.
4
Were I into online dating I would insist that we meet in a public library and select two of the same book that we could agree to sit down, in the library, and read chapter one; then go to a Starbucks and discuss what we’d read. Thus, eliminating sex-starved, self-obsessed, fortune hunting, alcoholic, and run of the mill creepy weirdos. So, I’d be totally amazed if any online guy would fall into my non-honey trap. In any event, if someone did take me up on this I’d order a vente latte. If we had a decent discussion and agreed to meet again our homework would be to finish the book, discuss over dinner at a coffee shop, then continue or discontinue our dating book club the following month. Baby steps, Baby!
23
For what it's worth; About 22 years ago when America on Line first arrived and we could enter chat rooms and meet people I joined one group, a nice (seemingly) of recently single Jewish men and women. Being just 49 years old and recovering from a brutal divorce (after 25 years of wedded bliss) I thought maybe I'd find a new companion.
Long story short I gave it up after about 5 dates. It was a total disaster. I couldn't believe the shallow, needy, insecure, obsessed with sex, money and drug crowd that showed up.
So, after getting off-line I went to temple to be with my children and to get away from the madding crowd. On Sept 30, 2000 I asked god (hoping she was on-line) to please send me a nice Jewish girl from my home town.
I guess the celestial Internet was working. Almost immediately after services I bumped into a very beautiful young woman ( 7 months younger than me!) who I had dated many years ago in high school.
I married her. We're together now since that day in temple. We care deeply about each other and take care of one another.
I'm going to be 72 and hopefully we'll be together for many more years. She's still beautiful and she lights up my life every day. I like the old-fashioned Internet best. Thank you god! No app required.
27
I attended a talk by Christian Rudder, the founder of OK Cupid, last year at CHI 2018, a design conference. It cured me forever from using online dating apps. A few things the OK Cupid team discovered analyzing their data: it is true that men of ALL ages tend to message women in their early twenties. This is a worldwide phenomenon. It is true except for a small number of younger men (20-25) who message older women (35-40). Yes, the cougar phenomenon is real! Appallingly, the chances of women over 50 of finding a male partner through the site is close to... zero! And as for descriptions, they don’t matter!! Only photos do. That’s actually with that insight that their team decided to create Tinder. The success of Tinder was not due to chance, it was a sure thing given all the data they had been gathering and the design experiences they had been running on OK Cupid.
As a designer, this CHI 2018 keynote fascinated me and made me hugely uneasy. We are toying with people’s feelings, not only revealing the biases of our society but somehow amplifying them by giving users what they want (which is for most men, messaging 20 year old women based on their looks?) It is social engineering in the hands of people who have at heart the profits of their companies and not the common good. It is leaving a lot of people unhappy but as long as they keep clicking and messaging and hoping it’s all good for the online dating companies. It is sad and unethical. Black mirror anyone?
14
I've been using online dating for a few years and my friend goes on and off of it - seemingly interested but convinced it's a waste of time. I read this article that vouches for online dating -
She dated about 86 men - one stole her AC, she licked cocaine off of keys and undressed at midnight in barcelona square and god knows what else.
There is a reason documentaries on online dating and murder exist. And this person is seeking out her own death.
6
To all the Men lamenting online dating; you are doing it wrong.
It’s a numbers game; there is a subset of women (est. 15-25%) that just want to have a good time.
Instead of droning on about sunsets, puppy dogs, and ice-cream; try being take charge and say “let’s go somewhere more intimate.”
Trust me; it works. They will take you up on it.
The 75% that aren’t interested; aren’t worth your time, money or future.
2
Online dating is not easy, but if you are sincerely looking for a relationship, you will eventually succeed (I met a woman I lived with for nine years on Match.com).
Yet after 3 years and 86 men, the author doesn't say what she is seeking in a man, but that she has "learned how to sext, licked cocaine off car keys and nursed someone thru an LSD trip?" That she will "stomp on her phone" if she meets one more man who seeks "a partner in crime" or calls himself a (gasp!) entrepreneur?
And she is baffled and angry about why people keep "ghosting" her?
9
Online dating is a definite plus in your life, if your life is to be set up that way. Some people have no social life and getting to know specific people you know you will like online will help with that. This kind of dating can behold also many benefits as she said in the article, which is a big thing for me to, to be able to learn and know different things and walks of life that are far from your own. It can be very risky getting into this sort of thing, you never know what you will get even with that tinder profile pic and bio, but that's what's fun about it, not knowing whether you will find the love of your life, or be left at the side or the road, heck, you might even get murdered or stalked afterword, its a coin flip really. There are many people in the world that are on the internet and might also be looking for eternal love, i love it! life is so complicated sometimes and then simple the next and you never know what will happen! There are so many cultures and races, families and religions that it's just so exciting being able to hear and experience those kinds of things and feelings from another human being. And basically all this could be true for the other person too, they could be just as curious and excited as you. Sure, there are break ups and heart breaks, but with this there really is plenty of fish in the sea of 1s and 0s, villains and heroes.
1
I hope some of the lonely guys and gals responding with comments about this piece, end up meeting one another. Love is so wonderful when it works, isn’t it?
7
Dictionary, "86" is a slang term that is used in the American popular culture as a transitive verb in the food service industry as a term to describe an item no longer being available on the menu.
5
I did online dating in 2002 and on my 19th meeting contacted the lady who is now my second wife. We lived a significant distance apart and talked on the phone for about a month before meeting. I brought her flowers, we kissed, and have never been apart since except for business trips.
You can meet your soulmate but it helps if you can read postings first that at least can show whether they are obvious frauds or just plain stupid. This culling out of the chaff makes the odds better of finding true love.
10
I compared the initial conversations to the IMing and chatgroups. ASL anyone remember that? It does enlarge your world by talking to people you would never have before. You may meet someone in person, make a friend, friend with benefits, date for a while, fall in love and get married. But it is also a time sucker and a lot of people are fake, but that is life aye
2
Beware of romance scam artists. Romance scams are ubiquitous. You might think you’re Skyping or talking to a Marine Corps officer stationed in Asia when you’re really taking to a group of African fraudsters calling you from an Internet cafe in Lagos, Nigeria. Don’t get played. Before you get any skin in the game, meet face to face. Never send money to anyone. They have such sad stories to tell. Hospital costs. Burial expenses. College tuition.
If the other party delays a ‘meet and greet - use your feet’. Quickly.
11
This writer turned lemons into lemonade. She didn’t sit around and lament what her childish husband did to her. She also didn’t give up on dating entirely after some clearly bad experiences. She took the opportunity for what it was— an opportunity to live, and grow, and learn.
And, she didn’t say she slept with 86 dudes, that would be medically risky. She might have, but don’t assume she did just because she is a risk taker.
What would you do if you were left alone in early thirties?
11
Love this Katharine!!
1
I enjoyed this article very much.
3
What's with these mid-career (white) female writers journaling about their new-found mid-life joie de vivre. Just a rehash of Eat Pray Love. It all sounds the same.
Ugh
6
I can't believe I read the entire piece, and there was no real punch line.
After online dating, I became a born again hermit and haven't looked back since.
One thing I learned from the experience:
There's a woman's agenda, and there's ....... A Woman's Agenda!
5
My advice is for everyone who is attermpting to get someone in their lives to share things with, whether it be a 24/7 mate or just someone who is a felloow-hobby chum, be honest with that person, painfully honest. If not, take it for granted life has a way of biting one in one's.......ah,......... behind.
Fulfill in our behavior with others that general, unwritten social contract all of us should just assume we have with those we encounter, a set of rules we can continuously base our actions on, all the while in as clear and intuitively a way as possible.
I know life is too complex to have a 'one size fits all of us the same way' kind of thing governing our behavior, but we should try and play by an imagined, similar set of rules all see as being 'ideal'. And discuss that notion once the formalities are over.
Relationships become only as lasting as the strength of the effort we put into them.,
And with that said, I wish everyone the best, believing truth telling is what starts us off on the right foot and keeps us padding along on the best of paths.
I'm a man in his 70's who lived a seasoned life, stood on the brink a couple of times, but because I was honest in my endeavors, my regrets are few.
5
@Josie As a woman of color, I've had the same experience. I'm in my 30s: advance-degree educated, employed, solvent and responsible, positive, kind, raised well, physically active and attractive. I'm not perfect, neither is anyone else. But more importantly seek a mature, evenly keeled partner with similar values and ultimately a partnership. It's very hard, even arguably harder for POC, I have observed. I am envious of the writer's experience and privilege as a white woman, as it is a vast departure from mine. My expectations are a respectful courtship but mostly have seen: minimal effort in terms of initiating conversations ("Hey Girl" "Wussup" "Can I show you a photo of a snake?"). With the expectation that I should be impressed, bowled over even that someone deign reach out to me. Ghosting online, by text or even when the relationship was more established. Or, a lack of honesty about one's eligibility - i.e. flirtatious married and looking men giving the wrong impression about their availability, and the the outright shock, hurt, and embarrassment of being blanked and ignored when the individual is out in public with their spouse. These are just a few of the interesting situations I've found myself in. But, hang in there. You sound amazing, like a real catch and definitely life goals. Hope the universe sends you someone amazing. Until then, anyone have a nice, single brother?
25
I hope that James, the boat builder as you referred to him, has found a woman who loves and appreciates him. Not many men would go out in the early morning hours in the dead of winter after a one night stand to buy you a cup of tea because “you don’t drink coffee.” And a dozen roses!! Really? My guess is that James is not the one who did the ghosting. I think you missed your Prince Charming. As for your on line dating - good luck with that.
5
Huh, I wonder, as a restaurant owner, whether the writer is aware of the meaning of "86" in my line of work?
3
I don’t think your troubles sound like online dating. If you are talking about 10th dates and road trips? That isn’t online dating, that is just dating. You may have met online but you had a real life date experience that went past 1-2 bad dates. Once you get into the 3rd or 4th date....does it really matter where the person came from? I think you could simplify the title of this article to...”dating is hard”
2
I bet the author got lots of interesting dates because she is an accomplished writer—the coin of online dating—likely among her other attractive traits.
2
I have to share that even in the LGBTQI+ community, dating is hard, on-line or otherwise. Finding other compatible people that are not simply nuts, wanting of basic adult skills: interpersonal communication, conflict resolution, heck, even independent living. Anything of value takes work (including relationships). However, there is considerable mythology/delusions around dating such as if you find your “soul mate” everything will be roses. I’m grateful to not be single but I have friends that span the full range of sexual orientation and its tough out there. Everyone seems to have trouble finding basic companionship and keeping it. My lesbian friends lament, “women are crazy!” However, the same refrain can come from my gay male friends, “women are crazy!” jk. :-P They say, “men are crazy.” It’s tough out there in dating land. We are all looking for connection and chemistry and compatibility count for a lot.
Finally, when you do find someone, put in some work, learn some healthy relationship, communication and conflict resolution skills. Learn to fight constructively, because fights will occur. Eliminate all swearing during fights, don’t stand up while having them, pick good times/places for hard conversations, etc. And if you think you need some relationship counseling, don’t wait for things to get super bad, be proactive. Over 20 yrs ago, my partner and I were taught a simple communication dynamic fix and honestly, its been relatively smooth sailing ever since.
5
A former surgeon general under Obama said the worst public health crisis in America is isolation and loneliness. He was right. I had a very good time meeting and enjoying women online. Many were just terrific. I believe they had a good time with me. I tried, put my back into it. I was not a passive partner. I appreciate everyone I dated more than once. I think we must employ every resource to reconnect with each other. Online dating is one of many ways. Just get out there and meet new people. All kinds of people. Be kind. Smile. Put your back into it if someone wants to engage.
8
86. Jesus Christ.
Online dating has calcified appearancism and superficiality. It's unquestionably bad for society. But by all means, ride that train if you've got a ticket.
4
Using a dating app is like ordering fast food from a picture menu . The food rarely lives up to the description and the photo shot in its most flattering light is deceiving. So you have dated 86 men in three years, either you are hotter than hot or not very discriminating. I'm 70 years old and haven't had more than 15 dates my entire life. Maybe I'm just a troll or far too picky. Whatever stay safe, life isn't a box of chocolates and you never know what or who your going to get.
8
Profiles are so ridiculous. Here's mine. "I am a sick man...I am a wicked man...An unattractive man...My liver hurts. Not just wicked, no, I never even managed to become anything: neither wicked nor good, neither a hero nor an insect. And now I am living out my life in my corner, taunting myself with the spiteful and utterly futile consolation that it is even impossible for an intelligent man seriously to become anything, and only fools become something. I wanted many times to become an insect, but was not deemed worthy even of that!" Anyone interested?
5
The comments below are a pathetic commentary on online dating.
The men report horrific rejection and low self esteem.
I suggest meeting people in person through joining healthy pursuits like skiing or other athletic activities.
Also book clubs where people get together to discuss recent reads.
Being open to meeting new people may be the best avenue to a new relationship.
6
The problem is the monogamy culture.
2
Black females are relegated to the bottom of the totem pole in the on-line dating world. White women and Asian women are the most sought after. I've been on E-harmony, Christian-Singles, and Match.com. You can go months and only get 1 like or interest. The stereo-types are embedded against black females and asian men. But, I can't fault the men. Men want what they want. And be wary of the out of country scammers.
3
You appear to be an adventurous, fun, smart lady who will never be without friends.
3
Thank the Lord Ms. Smyth is not a therapist. All this profligate, incandescent diversity of men would reduce to: "neurotic -- neurotic -- neurotic -- sociopath -- neurotic," on and on.
2
You have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince (or princess).
To the men who say this article ignores the “horrific” experience of online dating for men, let me assure you it’s equally horrific for women.
At the age of 67 and contemplating retirement to a rural area where there was probably one eligible male per ten square miles, I decided I should check out the online dating scene. I was terrible at it. Felt like a meat market. Diminished me. Was ready to quit. One last chance before I threw in the towel, I found an online dating coach (Evan Marc Katz, if you must know) who taught me how to navigate this crazy world.
Within six months I had found my man. We’ve been married two years and together four. Don’t tell me it’s not for men or women, don’t tell me it’s not for oldsters, don’t tell me I was just lucky. If you can set goals for your career, you can set goals for your intimate life.
I lived alone for 20 years. I was ready. I sought help. I applied myself and learned. I’m gratefully happy!
13
How cool would it be to meet someone in the comments section of the NYT?
Hi :) I’m Maria, late-20s gal living in LA
15
Her summerhouse. Say no more.
6
No mention of "catfishing" in this article? Online dating - thanks but no thanks.
2
Online Dating is one of methods to find a good partner. You can contact various types of men. You have been seriously damaged by your former partner who disappeared suddenly. His behavior was the worst as a man. Contacting various kinds of men, your sorrow will be healed and you can find ease in a new trustworthy partner.
1
Girl, you think straight online dating is soul-crunching? Wait until you hear about gay online dating stories...
1
Listening to others experiences in the internet dating classes I teach with my daughter to 50+plus somethings in New York City and Westchester added to my own encounters as a widowed, very senior, internet dater has made me an advocate, mostly. What I've learned is the site selected, the medium, whether mobile or desktop, your approach--you can make it a daily fixation or an indifferent activity--and even your profile and photo, although they do count--you will meet someone. Will they engage you? Will there be another date? Will this be your happy ever after? There are so many unknown variables. But life is full of unknown variables. What internet dating gives that casual encounters and blind dates and even "reading the obits" and being the first in line with a casserole, is agency! You control the delete, like, and send button. It's not real life but the older we get and the more our options to meet somebody narrow, it provides a broad real of choices. I'm a realist. A lifetime warranty on a new fridge means little . I'll settle for "happier ever after" And the knowledge that meeting on line is possible and highly probable!
4
While online dating may be a means to find adventure and explore other mindsets, it has been, in my 8-year experience with it, a lousy way to find a mate.
2
The fact that "ghosting" is even a word in the lexicon thoroughly disappoints me as a human being.
Yet it happens every day, most often in business.
So sad that technology, while for the most part advances human knowledge, convenience and communication has also allowed adult human beings to be able to childishly refuse to accept responsibility for another adult human's feelings and time.
When it has become so easy to avoid confrontation by "texting" a simple "sorry, not interested" with one never having to even hear a reply ... technology has given us the ability to completely leave many other humans "at the altar" on a daily basis. No closure is our new normal when it is finally so easy to avoid.
Ghosting is awful. How about we make it unacceptable?
10
This op-ed will surely bring Katherine lots of new dates - and lots more to write about.
Is she looking for love or attention?
Look her up on the internet - she’s insta-everywhere.
But read the comments! Painful, sometimes joyful, soul-revealing anecdotes into people lives. So honest. All you need is 1500 characters to tell your story. I could read them all day. Riveting.
8
As a veteran of more than a decade of these same online dating wars (off and on), I appreciate the way in which Ms. Smyth has sized up both the negatives (blows to self-esteem and erosion of common courtesy) and positives (remarkable adventures, romantic surprises, unexpected kindness, an expansion of our mindset, lasting friendship). She has reminded me of all that I gained in the process, which far outweighs the hurts and disappointments. I thank her for this ultimately poetic rendering of what has become the 21st-century dating experience for so many of us.
5
As someone who lost her husband to cancer after 30 years of marriage I understand the want to 'get back out there'. I'm in my 60's and have never, ever, been into the bar/club scene. I have a lot of interests and work in a field that is populated mostly by women and gay men. I'm in my 60's and wasn't ready to stay home and wait for a man to find me. So I began online dating. Met men who were nice but no "chemistry". Met men who were cowards and didn't have the b__s to say "goodbye" when they no longer felt the relationship was working. But in my opinion it's been worth it. And I'm with the author of the article, it's about the experience of meeting people with whom I may never had had the opportunity. And above all it's about not taking it all too seriously and for god's sake, having fun. If it ain't fun why do it?!
10
So much has changed in twenty years. For vast majority of singles nowadays it is a desert IRL ( in real life ) and dating apps are essential. Why so ? First of all, the younger generations do it all on the phone. They hardly look you in the eye. Many people shop online, drive cars and use automation so public human interaction is declining. Where can you meet someone ? Also, there is the creep factor and the metoo factor. If elsewhere than a dating sort of site, there is so much fraught tension because asking someone out can be perceived as inappropriate in the setting. Making any sort of amorous ask or even hint in the workplace or educational space can be construed as inappropriate. It can boomerang far beyond “no” and escalate to a slap-on-the-face in termination of your status at that place. So, for a man, if he goes to the dating site, the opposite sex there has basically announced her availability.
6
The author is a writer, a sort of artist who takes human beings for her subject. What serves her art is not necessarily what might serve her heart. In any case, as in most areas of life, in personal relationships one can go wide or one can go deep, and while the writer might defend the virtues or pleasures of going wide, I imagine that most of us dream of going deep and that the luckiest of us succeed at it.
21
You praise online dating because it kept you entertained. Ok.
Wanting a deeper relationship, I looked deeply into my own foibles, and discovered, as Paul Newman used to say, "Why eat hamburger out when I can have steak at home."
I found I needed to discover authenticity within myself, what is real, what is beating inside, to find someone who had done similar work on themselves.
Daily online dating deserves about as much praise as eating alone.
Try quality, for instance.
9
What a time consuming exercise! The effort vs reward ratio seems lop-sided and I'd rather travel and meet people along the way.
As a femme d'un certain age, and from my past on/off love/hate relationship with online dating over several years, the few and far between positive experiences were far outnumbered by the negative ones.
I finally realized that few if any bothered to read my profile, which would have eliminated most if not all the negative experiences. To test my theory, I planted couple of questions somewhere in the middle and at the end of my profile, and never once received a response!
8
I had an elderly well traveled friend, an agnostic, who once told me "I get more out of going to the bathroom than going to church".
I believe I can say the same about this article
14
I met my wife through online dating, and it worked because we were both mature, self-respecting people who wanted a lasting relationship based on love and respect. And we both got really lucky that we met!
As read about Ms Smyth's experiences, and I am reminded of Faye Miller's line about Don Draper: "you only like the beginnings of things." Online dating makes it much easier to experience beginnings, which is why so many people have experiences like she has.
15
You make a great point. The problem for me has been that the majority of online dating men of my age only want the beginnings.
3
I'm in my 40's, divorced with kids. I've done the online dating thing. I took the time to get to know a few men, some over several months, but nothing felt completely right. I admit I was probably not in a great frame of mind for dating.
I used to worry deeply about being alone for the rest of my life.
Then I realized that I am pretty fulfilled by my kids, extended family, pets, friends, work, hobbies, and travels. So I shut down my online dating profile almost a year ago and that felt like the right thing to do.
If finding a long term partner is going to happen for me, it will happen offline.
I wish everyone who is dating much happiness!
18
86 partners.
there are studies linking a high number of partners to a difficulty to engage in a serious monogamous relationship.
though the younger generation might be the online dating one, trauma is trauma is trauma...
and nothing of the navel gazing kind so popular these days amongst all "self-help' doctrines, whether clearly spelled out as such, or not, including this article, will change that.
maybe therapy would... here's hoping!
8
After a 35 year marriage I was handed my freedom. I resisted on line dating for several years. I tried it for a very short time. There was, to me, way too much emotion on display from strangers. People imbued the experience with all kinds of anticipation and put way more hope on it than it can generally sustain. One of my children did meet their delightful spouse that way. I think it works better for young people.I found several of the men to be lonely and very unguarded in a way that concerned me. Others clearly had decided to shop forever; the paralysis of choice . In my age group some were impotent and just thought it best to get that fact on the table right away . I did not evaluate their claims in any other way. Several were insistent on being given one's exact age to the month, weight to the pound, and asked suspicious questions about whether one's children were troublesome. Others were not satisfied with the pictures provided rudely demanding a bathing suit photo or no dice. Of course this was the Playboy generation. I just wanted to find someone intelligent, well read, healthy, funny and I prefer them short and don't mind bald. Several were perfectly nice but no sparks. I am sure this was a mutual aassessment. Level of education seemed to cause issues. I fled for my sanity in 5 weeks. I have been seeing someone for some years now. We met in a work encounter. There were sparks-so important . Good essay though. Well done. But 86 encounters - exhausting at any age?
22
well said.
1
My fiancé ghosted me. I guess that is a little bit like leaving in the middle of the night. It is the most awful feeling ever(people, stop doing this). I’m glad you’re able to get out there and get on with it.
21
I think women have huge advantages when it comes to on-line dating. From what I have read, most Dating web sites have more men than women. Thus women have more choices... And men still usually are expected to pay and plan the first few dates. So the author of this article does not even acknowledged that most of her amazing dating experience was most likely enabled and sponsored by men she was dating...
11
I have been married for over half my life now. I sympathize with the author's devastation over being left abruptly by her husband and with the need to discover a new identity. My existence would be judged exceedingly narrow by this article's standards, and I'll gladly take it.
Today I picked up my daughter from summer camp, had a slice of pizza, went looking for a misplaced credit card and tried to deal with a mess of papers on my dresser...again. It's the business of working, raising children and contributing to my community that brings meaning to me.
18
No thanks. My dog is more supportive, loyal, and kind than any man I've ever known. I'm not surprised the NY Times ran this article. It's well written for sure, but just another way the patriarchy tries to manipulate young women to stay in the game.
22
I found this article interesting. I've been married and "off the market" for several years. I'm wondering, do men ask women out for dates in person? If so, how are these requests received?
1
86 dates in 3 years?? That's the number of rejections I get in a few months.
3
You and me both, buddy. In about 3 or 4 years of online dating, I've actually met 4 people in person. Most just disappear.
1
You make me thankful for my 31 year old marriage.
18
As well you should be... but please don't gloat. It's not as if the rest of us chose to be in this position.
4
There is a country western soung with lyrics that describe the delusional descriptions presented by online dating. I drive a red corvette, have six pak abs and live in my mothers basement.
I personally have had more luck with Speed Dating which was well organized. After speaking a few minutes with a man I could sense a comradery. It would keep me with six months of dating material and several men.
i am still single but enjoy life.
4
IRL I've dated some great people. Online was a bust. Fake profiles. Lots of fake matches before you pay to subscribe. Dearth of matches after you pay. So much lying about age. Pictures taken 20 years ago. Hard to do that IRL. YMMV.
5
I just wish we could all agree that all dates go dutch. I'm tired of people mooching for free food, or people thinking you somehow 'owe' them because they bought you an expensive meal. Adults can & should pay for their own dates. No more resentment, no more entitlement, no more obligation! Dutch dating for all!
30
I’m sure your ok Cupid profile is as delightfully written as the assay.
I’ve had one since okstupid was called spring street personals. It’s evolved over time, and might be an over share, but it tells a prospective date about me.
Unfortunately, so many women don’t put much effort into writing, or answering the questions.
I’d love to know what our match percentage is, but alas, geography makes it so random.
Hope springs eternal, but for this midwestern, liberal, never married, non-smoking, atheist Jew, who still plays hockey, the matching by algorithm isn’t getting any better.
6
Most couples I meet these days found each other via online dating. That’s how I met my wife, and we recently celebrated our 10 year anniversary.
I had a sense of fun about the various dates I went on before meeting my wife. Most were fun but not “love connections”. I made it clear in my profile that I wasn’t just looking for hookups. My wife and I aren’t into bars, so online dating was a good alternative for us. The lesbian online dating scene may be different in atmosphere than the straight or other scenes. Worked for us!
5
Call me old fashioned, but this whole ghosting thing is not only infantile, but wholly inconsiderate. Why don't these people man up and let their dates know why they don't think it will work out. Stop hiding behind your technology and learn how to navigate uncomfortable emotions with some grace. Ghosting creates a lot of unnecessary confusion, anger, and anxiety.
21
@Father of One
Because often women get angry or violent. I've been slapped hard and kicked in the shin with a boot. I told one woman over 50 that she was out of my age range. She replied by telling me how she wished I'd die in a fire. Most men who ghost have similar stories. Often women react very badly to rejection. Very. I guess men might do so too. It's about avoiding vitriol and violence.
Ghosting is a pretty clear answer. If a person doesn't want to see you again, the reason really doesn't matter. You're not hot enough, not smart enough, not good enough in bed, not rich enough, not funny enough, not well dressed enough. Who wants to know these answers? Ghosting is a form of kindness.
3
What sticks is the number of men - 86 - she took the trouble to date, with not a keeper among ‘me: too picky or crazy. I go with option B.
14
Yes something is not adding up, well actually it is; 86 guys and not a keeper? I go for option B as well.
2
I thought the point of online dating was to profile yourself and desires to MATCH others with their displayed persona.
That doesn't seem to work to establish compatible relationships for the writer. Instead it just expanded the pool of random jacks who would not otherwise be known. No increased likelihood of fit compared to just walking up to people on the street and saying hi.
I am increasingly dismayed at the sham of the internet in it's promotion of fake and fad over the real and true. I swipe left, chug in disbelief and bite the lime of public discourse.
9
As usual, I'm annoyed by the black and white thinking in these comments.
There are a few running themes here:
1.) Online dating didn't work for me, therefore it is terrible.
2.) I met my partner in real life and that's the way it should be done (which assumes that those who use online dating as a tool aren't also receptive to/capable of meeting people in the wild).
3.) This article couldn't possible apply to me because I'm: [fill in the blank].
Guess what, y'all? It's what you make of it. Prefer to meet people the old fashioned way? Nobody is stopping you. Not getting the results you want? Perhaps reconsider your standards and ask if they're reasonable.
Unfortunately, not everyone is going to get the results that they want. If you're an older woman, you can thank evolutionary theories of mate selection for that one. And of course the instances of racism/classism/sexism/etc are ever present. But, if you're patient, don't invest too much of yourself in the process, and continue trying to meet people as you go about your daily life, then you might be pleasantly surprised by those who come your way every once in a while.
I'm still single, but like the author I've met a number of interesting people over the years, a few of whom are still friends of mine today. Yes, it makes me cringe sometimes, but I take it for what it is (a tool) and continue enjoying my life offline. Online dating provides an opportunity to meet people who you might not have otherwise.
37
@Jen
very sensible perspective; what are you doing tonight?
2
To men commenting that online dating yields them few responses from women, compare your online profile to your LinkedIn page. Are you representing yourself in the best possible way to attract attention, both prose and photos, in the same way you would carefully construct your resume to attract the best job offers?
Just like there are professionals that will help you brush up your resume, there are services that will rewrite your profile based on a phone interview. When I starting dating my now-fiance, who I met offline, we decided it would be fun to show each other our online dating profiles. I was surprised that he came across as humorless (hostile even) and his prose focused narrowly on one or two specific interests. It said nothing about the incredibly funny, worldly and soulful man I fell instantly in love with in person. I likely would have skipped over it completely. I showed him mine, that I had written myself based on a *sample* from the aforementioned profile writing service, which is based on capturing your personality through storytelling and his response - "Wow - marry me."
Professional photos also go a long way.
To women - the above illustrates that if you're not exactly bowled over by someone's profile, remember that not everyone is a writer or is exceptional in describing themselves. If you reject a potential date on a lackluster profile, you may be missing out on a fun night out, or even a boyfriend.
17
@Michelle I don't think dating should be a job interview. The hope is that dating will lead to love and a life partner, someone who both appreciates you for who you are and someone you can pay bills, raise kids, and do the other messy stuff in life with. Whether one is worthy of love shouldn't be determined by professional photos or paying someone to write a profile. If a woman is that shallow, I'm not interested.
Moreover, one big issue men have is height. Should I lie about that? Or are there paid professional who can make "Height: 5'6"" seem taller?
I get what you are saying most people write very bland profiles. But there is a flip side where a lot of women write profiles that try to seem fun and exciting and have professional pics; those profiles seem fake. I'm turned off by them.
Most people are unfortunately bad at writing about themselves in some form or another. There are just some things that you can't read in an essay or photos, that come from body language, the social interaction with another, etc. That you learn from gradually forming a rapport. Things like that someone is funny and soulful. I'm amazed that you advise people to pay for a professional dating profile when you met a great guy in real life, and a guy with a lame profile. Your last paragraph is good. But I would think (a) swipe right on every man least you miss a great guy with a lame profile and (b) get out of your house and off your phone would be better advice.
3
@Michelle
Professional photos for a dating service? That's creepy and self-aggrandizing. People want to know what you really look like; no onr wants a Photoshop version.
1
I am dismayed by the tsunami of negative comments - most especially the personal attacks on the author. This is a beautifully written piece, and although I have never online dated, nor plan to, I loved this introduction to Katharine Smyth’s writing, and will definitely plan to read her memoir - All The Lives We Ever Lived.
22
What we have once enjoyed deeply we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes a part of us.”
–Helen Keller
6
@WAXwing01, agree.
My mother wasn't right about much, but she was right about this one thing: Live your life. Do things you want to do. Get out there. That's how you meet someone.
In my 20s, back in the late 70s and early 80s, I went to bars, singles dances, joined singles groups, did what was then called "computer dating" from questionnaires found in diners and mailed in, and personal ads -- back when NO ONE was dating from personal ads. Oh, I dated a lot, and had a lot of short-term relationships, and met one guy in a dance club that I wanted to marry for three years, until I gave up -- and then HE wanted to get married, but I no longer did.
Then one day when I was 28, I went out with some friends, and one of THEIR friends was a ridiculously handsome, funny guy who was weird in the exact same quirky way that I was. We were married for 27 years, together for 30, until he died six years ago.
I moved away, built a new social circle of all women, and at this point in my 60s my life is plenty full without "finding someone else." I see what women my age are enduring in a quest to find a partner, and all I can think of is "Why on earth would you put yourself through that?" Thanks, but no thanks.
132
I put myself through that because I would like to die knowing what you know about love.
77
it's a pity you lost hope. I'm a guy who did pretty much the same things you did. yet the last woman I knew in who stopped having even a wish for a new man in her life, about 18 months after making the same statement you did of no longer wanting a relationship, found one. it's been 23 year now. these paths are highly varied.
4
@Mr
Brevity is the soul of wit - and wisdom. Well Said!
3
Thank heavens I am married to a sweet, kind, forgiving guy. Today would be more concerned about getting a mental health profile (def no "sociopaths" allowed), an STD history, and more. The online dating is a true "hit and miss". Have one girlfriend in her mid 30s that managed to find a nice guy but for everyone else, forget it.
6
@Sand Dollar. Indeed. Dating someone who has slept with his own sister (as mentioned in the article) seems like a terrifying prospect, and yet, she suggests it was great.
1
See Mario Vargas Llosa,"Travesuras de la Niña Mala" translated as "Bad Girl".
Yes--multiple editions of My Fair Lady/Guy can be educational--picaresque novels.
But after a while THAT'S dilution--spreading yourself thin.
For a high concentration lifestyle, try parenting or co-parenting.
It's like getting a bigger "self"--you live vicariously through each kid.
Yes--also a bit like a multiple personality--another kind of picaresque novel.
4
More than anything else, online dating is empowering. No, don’t laugh. If nothing else, it frees you from staying with someone just because you’re afraid you’ll never meet anyone.
By the way, married 6 years, partner for 13, with someone who contacted me just as I was deciding to take a break for awhile. I’m 62.
14
@Barbara, dunno but it seems to me if you are a thirty something or mid 30s "unmarried" woman looking for a married relationship "still" then you have been left behind and getting desperate, just saying. Desperate attracts desperate. At 35 my unmarried female friends are in panic mode and settling for the worst of the worst.
1
"It can enlarge your world" is an utterly vapid defense that can be used to promote anything. Any defense of online dating which I'm going to take seriously needs to explain how something that reduces relationship-seeking to a dehumanizing game where you win by being as superficial as possible and encourages everyone to view other people as disposable commodities is SO much better than what we had before that it's it worth all the (in my view entirely negative) changes to society that have been ushered in.
27
Thank you for putting into such a concise form what I’ve been struggling to articulate for years!
5
Reality is not a novel. People sometimes want to have a life that is a dream, a novel, a story, something that looks good from the outside. Others want to have things, property, money. It's like there is not enough inside so they need to fill it with outside stuff. Others subscribe to the view that life is like an adventure park: travel, relationships, sexual events, movies, fine food and wine. Others thing it is a family story.
"What's it all about, Alfie? Is it just for the moment we live." When we get back to the core issue, we see its a view of the meaning of life, our life. Some things some god made the meaning of life. Others subscribe a notion of evolutionary accident. And we are mammals, descendents of those who escaped the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.
So we choose, perhaps to a limited degree, what we think life is about and live that life, or fail to do so. Many expect confirmation of their choice in an afterlife, a heaven. Others are just busy dealing with the day to day reality of sustenance and existence, profundities and pondering aside.
Again, we are mammals, we life relationships, we have a sexual and social set of vectors as we go through stages of our life. And soon, the limits of Earth and climate change will impinge on many, since the story of humans takes another turn, irrespective of personal perspectives. BOL!
3
She's obviously adventuring through dating. Which is fine, if that's what you're up for. I find a mixed bag - those who want hook-ups, FWB, poly, occasionally a relationship. But I miss dating where there were surprises, conversation and an openness to getting to know someone. Still I use apps because they're there; not because they really work. When I move they're useful to get out and meet people, but I'm not so sure about real relationships...
7
I wouldn't want to be guy #87.
Unfortunately, online dating encourages women to treat men as if they are disposable. The simple fact is that more men than women use these platforms. At 40 years old and up, it is 2 men to every woman online. For those in their early twenties, it is 4 to 1 men to women.
Because of the imbalance of men to women, women can get away with a lot of bad behavior. A lot of them have no romantic interest in their dates but go out anyway because they are bored or looking for a free dinner.
9
@Dan I am in my early 40s and used online apps for dating for about 3 years. I agree, people in the online dating scene, in general, are not very nice to one another.
Please know men treat women as disposable too. It’s the culture of online dating and it’s the number one reason I don’t participate anymore.
Most every woman I know can buy her own dinner and not deal with the stress and fear that comes with an unknown date. Also, most woman probably won’t feign interest in a man in order to convince him to have sex with her, but many men do that.
My point is: It’s rough on both sides.
20
Online dating is fine but many people would prefer to meet someone through a hobby, activity, gym, etc. You can physically see the person so they cannot lie about their age, appearance nor will you waste any time. To each his own.
5
The comments in here can be summed up as:
1) married people justifying their life choices by saying how terrible online dating sounds, regardless of how happily married they are (see the comments in the japanese marriage article from last week to get an idea how happily married many women actually are. I think it’s a suckers deal for women and a great deal for men. Divorced moms really do seem the happiest).
2) Bitter single men complaining about how shallow and mean women are (even as these men judge women far harsher than they are judged)
3) single people (like me) generally supporting the authors premise.
Advice to single women looking for long-term love: get off the apps and pursue your hobbies in real life to meet a compatible partner (cycling club, classes (language, cooking, coding, whatever), etc). “Looking for your soulmate” on the apps is a futile effort and saying that on the apps scares away a lot of men, even if they ultimately want the same thing. On the apps, go in with low(er) expectations and there’s a chance you could strike gold.
19
@FD822 Well, the tone of your comment is: 1) Marriage is a prison for women. 2) Single men are bitter. 3) Single people are awesome.
I do think in wider pop culture, including the media and advertising from the Match Group Apps (OkCupid, Tinder, Match.com) there has been an active attempt to promote the single life as sexy and desirable.
Moreover, I think there has been a "switch" of sorts where it supposedly used to be that women wanted love and men wanted sex and no commitment. It is probably true that many men have always wanted love. But now it seems amongst people my age, women want the excitement of an amazing single life whereas men want a committed relationship. And the experience of men dating in some sense is generally awful in that we have to ask women out and often get rejected, we pay for dates, and we swipe right quite generously on dating apps while nearly all women swipe left on us. (By the way, the idea that men judge women harshly especially on looks is largely a myth.) I don't think men are bitter per se, they are understandably confused and frustrated that they can't find a woman who appreciates them of who they truly are and wants a long-term relationship.
About "looking for a soulmate", I'm not looking for a dream girl who fulfills my every romantic whim. I might look for a soulmate in someone who matches my temperament and I can share a life with. I would tone down the talk of "soulmate" or "partner in crime" to something more grounded.
9
Thank you. You summed it up pretty well.
1
@FD822
Interesting put down.
1
The best aspect of online dating is that I know for the most part (not including the scams, fake profile, bots and cheaters) that the women on the sites are actually there to meet someone.
This might sound arrogant, but I never really had a problem meeting women, I am tall, good looking, fit, educated and friendly. My only issue was availability and approaching someone who might be in a relationship was always a factor. Online dating has freed me up from that one hurdle.
4
When a natural disaster displaced me last year - lava - I came to California to start a new life from scratch. I had only been divorced 6 months, and was traumatized on all fronts. I downloaded tinder and first date the man told me he was married. However, my second date is still happening one year later! 52 and totally in love.
11
Katharine's list of 86 dates recalls Don Giovanni and his list; he would probably have loved online dating! And a well written piece which brought back some memories.
I started dating with match.com at the breakup of a 35 year marriage. Not easy for a middle aged man to jump back into the pool after all that time. I certainly kissed more than a few frogs, had my share of dates where my only thought was how soon could I politely bring it to an end, and enjoyed an incandescent on-the-rebound relationship of several months which predictably crashed and burned dramatically. And like the author, those experiences opened me to the infinite variety of other people's lives.
Two years in, I met my second wife. Due to my distance filter on the dating site, I had not seen her bio, but she had cast her net a bit wider and reached out to me. Our first date - afternoon tea and a walk on the nearby bike path - only ended when we both had to go; we agreed there and then to continue the non-stop conversation soon on a second date, and we've been talking ever since.
My advice to would-be daters. Be honest, write well, take chances in who you contact, and be safe when you first meet.
18
At age 57, as an. older woman, I found online dating completely demoralizing. I near-kissed a lot of frogs, but I did end up with a Prince.
15
I’m working in a job where I meet tons of interesting people -superficially. You don’t need to use internet websites to have an interesting life
7
One issue greater nowadays harks to the adage- ‘don’t get your honey where you get your money’. Though it does occur readily, it is is virtually taboo. And the blowblack can be devastating if one aggrieved person makes it a case in the workplace or elsewhere, legitimate or not.
@Suburban Cowboy. It is possible to meet people in real life in other ways besides work.
1
It's been many years now since I last dated, which was through an online dating website, and I can totally relate to the author's every word. What I learned about myself through in/off Internet dating (back in the good old days when it was free and most of the guys were professionals in the IT field and the chances of guys who were scammers or on the downlow were scarce) for about three years after my second divorce was I finally figured out what kind of guy I wanted. I was very aware of and could spot a hundred miles away what I didn't want, lessons learned from two failed marriages and brief live-in rebound relationship after my first divorce. By using Internet dating sites, I learned how to distinguish between how a guy presents himself on a profile to figuring out what wasn't there, or embellished. I also learned, surprise, surprise, I wanted someone like me! What a revelation, lol, but it's stood me well in the few, brief times I've dated since those first few years after my second divorce, made me learn to trust my instincts and not reply to sketchy profiles, spot guys who had a serious disconnect between who they thought they were and who they really were, and to walk away before having sex so it only hurt my pride, not my heart.
5
After countless dating apps, dates, and mini relationships the best thing that I learned was to love myself. Eventually, when I was content with myself, I met the best partner for me who had gone through a similar process. We were both so tired of the constant searching, the need for dopamine hits, and the shadiness of dating apps. However, we could only truly have met after we had truly met ourselves.
11
Guy here. 100 dates, around 70 of which were from apps. It has been profound life experience, incredibly fun, and I agree with the author. The people I have met have been almost universally inspiring and have elevated my belief in humanity. It's beautiful how many people are doing good or creative or fascinating work in this world.
Yet the author surprisingly does not recognize how she is uniquely lucky to have such good experiences. I will readily admit that privilege and being fortunate to be found superficially attractive have allowed me to select for a "1%" so to speak of people to go on dates with. Good people also don't ghost.
I fear (and know from friends) that experiences for most people online dating are indeed not enjoyable. You have to be able to screen and research and have enough people in a pool interested in you to screen out all but the best, just as the author did. I would guess that more women can easily go on many dates, and that there are a smaller number of lucky men who can get high numbers of dates (as perhaps I did).
This means there are likely an even larger percentage of unlucky men. There is no easy answer to this but I recommend "Blueprint" by Christakis (recently reviewed in the NYTimes) as a book that discusses the consequences of unequal mating societies, including lonesome, jealous, angry men (see this week's mass shooters).
PS to end happily though: I found an amazing partner who I am steady with and hope to spend my life with.
8
@Resident MD
I was about to comment how the lack of diversity (demographics, careers, goals, provinciality, creative types v sports obsessed, etc) in the Boston area has made my online dating journey much less experientially rich than the author’s. I keep thinking I might be better off moving back to NYC, where there is more potential compatibility. But....when I read comment, just thought I’d ask, got any single friends?
7
I have a friend who dates on-line 3 times a week.. He has it perfected to be able to read the situation and be out in 10 minutes- [many women lie about their looks and age] .. He's been at it for 3 years and his longest relationship lasted a month. I'm convinced it's not the women with the problem-it's definitely him.
16
What problem ? He seems to be thriving.
Great writing, great thinking and funny to boot. Thanks Katharine!
4
A Lesson in Ghosting Before Ghosting was a Thing
I met a guy through Match and after four dates, we both were excited about our compatibility and that we had found each other. One night I received a text about how much he missed me. I was smitten! Then came radio silence. No text, call, or email and he took down his Match profile.
At my next counseling session I told Stella, my 60-something (more a grandma than therapist) counselor, “I don’t know what I did to make him disappear!”
She took a moment of silence to get my attention and replied, “Susan, not everything is about you.”
Mind blown! What? I had never considered that his absence was due to something that had nothing to do with me. Several years later I heard from him and he apologized for disappearing. He shared that his ex-wife was using meth and he was trying to get custody of their kids.
I have many other memories of wisdom from Stella, but that epiphany changed how I view the people in my life and I try to remember that not everything is about me.
20
I love this article and couldn’t agree more. I was dared to go on 150 dates myself after a breakup and felt many of the same things you’re feeling. I always try to explain it to people but can never articulate myself as well as you did in this article
3
Well I love the story but unless you are in a large city with a varied selection I am afraid the adventures are not as readily available. When I was working and traveled I met such interesting people. Retired now and in my 60's I find the men are always either talking about the wife who cheated or the wife who passed away. Granted I do live in a tiny town in Rhode Island not Bushwick Brooklyn. I do have many a girlfriend who live in the city and they find a shortage of honest interesting dates. Possibly the real adventure is youth and the eternal promise of our lives being full of promise?
19
this writer sounds like a tourist who wants writing material.
17
If you heterosexuals think online dating is tough, try being gay. As God is my witness, half of the guys who show up are wearing their wife's panties, want to be tied up, slapped around, and used by a gang...but NO gay stuff!!
I'm serious.
And I tend to be a bit on the midwest blunt side for most Pacific Northwesterners. The first time I got a pic from a guy like that asking me if his wife's underwear made his butt look small, I answered honestly. "No, I said, "Will Smith could go parasailing across the Grand Canyon in those panties. And I'm sure they don't make your wife's big butt look small, either." Never heard from him again.
122
@tom harrison
You mean you learn of these desires after meeting instead of before? Isn't hiding the truth a lie of omission? It seems best to steer away from liars of all sort. You need a better app or a personal algorithm to triangulate scammers no matter their underwear.
You got an Eames chair? Score!
27
I'd like to see the NY Times run an article about a man who dates multiple women in different cities throughout the world with reckless abandon just for the sake of experience - this article would never be printed. Ever.
231
@Jason not to offend but we as women and girls have heard and read that story our entire lives. Maybe not in the NYTimes but it's been done. Possibly look in the archives. Loved the story. My on-line dating was never this exciting.
53
@Jason
You act both indignant and perplexed when we all know the reason such an article would never be printed. Pointing this out does nothing to help the underlying issue. Would it be nice to live in a world where both articles, by both genders, are printed? Yes. But unfortunately, we live in a world where women feel pervasively unsafe because they are repeatedly attacked and abused by men. You probably do not even realize how lucky you are to have the privilege to feel as safe as you do in the world. A man is able to travel, and date, in a way that a woman is not.
36
@Jason
Gynocentry, we will see what happens, but the early results are not looking so good!
6
Yeah it’s not for everyone. But we all seem to agree that going online is a good way to find a new book to read, or a new job opportunity, or a dinner recipe. So is it somehow it’s better to just leave romantic relationships up to proximity and chance? By that logic we should only read the books at the local bookstore, wait to be promoted within our current company, and go home to a dinner (alone) of food our mothers cooked.
The writer is trying to convey there is a larger world out there and there has never been a better time to be single. Those 80 dates were nights out, a life lived. Bravo to those with the courage to enter the ‘arena’; those that still know that much of life is failure, and that it’s the journey not the destination that makes life interesting.
18
Not very smart to go back and have sex with a complete stranger on first date! Esp to his apartment. I know it says 10th date, but he didn't know she drank tea, so clearly not tenth date with same guy....writer is lucky he wasn't a psycho.
27
Sharon pls calm down this is a grown woman who can make her own decisions
I don’t think marriage locks anyone down unless they agree to be locked down.
My wife and I first connected six years ago on a dating website, sent emails back and forth for six weeks, then spoke on the phone, before meeting on a humid October evening at my condo where we spent the night together. We’d both exited 10 year sexless marriages just nine months prior.
Our chemistry rarely wanes, we talk about our troubles, gossip about others, fantasize mightily, and fight when necessary.
Our secret. She kept right on meeting and dating men online while I agreed to sign off, stay home, make the coffee, and listen intently to her tales.
33
@Stephen V, not to be disrespectful, but your relationship sounds one sided. Your partner doing that you is disrespectful. Consider if the genders were flipped.
But if your relationship makes you happy... who am I to judge?
27
@Stephen V
Very amusimg watchimg you spike the football after six years.
1
Sometimes ghosting is not what you think.
After about 1.5 years of online dating (and laughing at the fakes -- about 85% of the men who wrote to me or winked at me or liked a photo were fakes), I met a man I really connected with. We were very different; he loved heavy metal music while my tastes lean towards classical. He was a daily marijuana user and I've never smoked pot, not even in college, and have no interest in it. But he was smart and articulate and we made each other laugh. We dated casually for about four months; things were progressing nicely. We hadn't met each other's families or gone away for a romantic weekend but I could see that on the horizon.
One day, we had made plans to meet for lunch and he did not show up. I was quite upset that he hadn't even texted me that he wasn't going to make it. My texts to him went unanswered. Online articles called this ghosting -- but offered no comfort.
About a week after the missed date, i woke up with a realization. Heavy metal guy would text me if he was running even 10 minutes late. Something told me to check the obituaries. And there it was -- he had died, very suddenly, on the day of our missed lunch. I had not met his family or friends so no one would have known to contact me. I was fortunate to find out in time to attend his funeral. Learning about him from people who spoke at the funeral made me realize that he was a very fine person that I was just getting to know.
I still miss him.
541
@Zinnia
Thank you for saying this. Someone I was dating long distance, called every single day for over six months, sometimes twice a day. Then suddenly no call for one, two, then three days. I left a light-hearted text a long the lines of "Missed hearing your voice today!" But by the third day I was starting to worry. I left a text saying "Okay, three days no call? I'm really starting to worry you got hit by a bus or something."
His sister called me the next day to tell me he was in a medically induced coma in the hospital after a major five car accident on the highway while riding his motorcycle. (Someone in a truck had not secured the mattress they were moving and it had flown off and onto the highway). z
Yes, ghosting isn't always what you think.
50
@Zinnia It goes without saying that your story, and the 'ghosting' that turned out to be something quite different, would be very shocking and really make you question the universe...the strangeness and randomness of life...of the people you meet, etc.
But that's not to say that true ghosting hasn't become more of the norm, in this day and age of electronic communication. Overall, society and people have lost their ability to be vulnerable...to allow themselves to be in awkward, difficult, very human situations.
I had a guy ghost on me. In retrospect, I should not have been surprised, as there were many other signs this guy was not the greatest. But, it was a really great roller coaster ride of a relationship while it lasted.
Thing was though, I'd never heard of ghosting at the time. Was utterly shocked as to why he was suddenly unavailable to answer my calls, nor was he calling me. It was extremely difficult for me to comprehend, and ultimately accept. We'd had an extremely intense physical relationship for 6 weeks, and then....nothing. No option for me to find out why, etc. The door was simply slammed in my face. (And no, this guy was still very much alive...that much I later determined...)
I've heard some (likely 'ghosters') say that ghosting can often be the kinder way to end a relationship, to which I say 'that's hogwash'. Who's kidding whom...it's just a way for the ghoster to not have to be a true grownup.
66
@Zinnia This is so, so, so beautifully written, and so deeply sad. I feel like I too got to know him a bit, just in this glimpse. I'm so sorry for what you're going through.
I hope you know what a talented writer you are. This was an extraordinary piece that made me feel and think so much more intensely than the original article. I'm sure I'm not the only one who would love to settle down with the longform version, whether that was fiction or memoir.
7
Her parents "summer home." A picture on her website with a horse. What else do we need to know about her?
14
Who are these women that are inundated with 100s of responses? Wish I knew what that was like.
I'm a woman of color over the age of 50. I'm never gonna be a size 8 (or probably even a size 12), but I work out with a trainer, walk and do yoga, regularly. I have an advanced degree, am an executive in finance who is well-compensated, own my own home and have traveled the world. I keep up on current events, am a great cook, can have an intelligent conversation and am in the process of writing a novel in my spare time. Am I a supermodel? No, but I don't think I'm less attractive than the average woman out there. I take care of myself, am interesting, friendly and loyal.
But if my profile said I was on fire and I needed a nice guy with a steady job (not to buy me things, so I know I won't have to buy *you* things!) to throw a bucket of water on me to put me out, I'd be dead by now. Other than the odd weirdo looking for a quickie (or perhaps a scam target), my online dating inbox was as barren as the Atacama Desert. All the posters claiming to be nice, responsible, successful guys who can't get a response? Ha! I've not seen any of you. Maybe stop looking for blonde, 20-something, fitness instructors and you'll have some luck.
311
Ditto all you’ve said here!
20
My experience with online dating years ago (when I was single) is that, while expands the universe of contacts, it also amplifies biases and judgments as to looks, race, weight, height, age, class, etc. But you sound like you have a lot to offer, so I would encourage you to persist and hang in there.
24
@Josie
I recall an article, probably NYT, about choice. The study's finding was that the more choices you have, the less you are able to choose.
I fear that online dating apps simply lure everyone into looking for one more date with one more beguiling stranger, then one more, then one more, then one more, till they wander off without bothering to say goodbye. Nobody settles. The app convinces you that there must be someone better out there--somewhere--instead of this flawed and very human person who could offer you love and companionship if you'd only slow down and choose.
Wish I knew the solution, but I don't think dating apps are the answer. We need more games we can play with strangers, which then help us to find friends. If the guys would only come out and play. I recommend pickle ball, for one.
Good luck, and let yourself find friends, if not love.
15
Sounds depressing rather than inspiring. Perhaps IRL is actually better although it takes more patience than picking dates off an ever turning lazy Susan.....
9
I was going to say...this is praise?
I'm no prude, but, uh, slept with his sister?
28
This article is clearly a spectacular work of fiction. The idea that all these alleged “adventures” happened over the course of three years is not only unlikely, but completely absurd! Did give up her job, stop cleaning her home, picking up the dry cleaning, caring for her pets, visiting her family and hanging out with her friends? Did the Times actually take the time to fact check any of these alleged characters she claimed to have met to see if they actually existed? The writer has a fertile imagination; I hope people don’t take up online dating with the idea that they will share the company of these “colorful characters,” for they shall be sorely disappointed.
25
My God how depressing.
11
With 86 men and counting over some 3 years, including nursing someone through an LSD trip, it sounds like the author needs to be more selective.
32
Katherine, thank you for this. Back in 2004, there was match.com. #12 and I found each other and we’ve been together ever since. We both lied in our profiles! We’re mature enough to laugh about it now, and forgive each other, and talk about the matches that didn’t work out as well... for me, a couple were downright dangerous! All’s well that ends well.
6
Online dating apps are the anvil on which emotions are crushed.
6
Ghosting. I hate that word. It’s another sign of the illness and misrepresentation of the digital age. Are there ghosts in real life? What does this mean? Anyway, People don’t disappear in real life if you really were connected he would’ve been able to sustain that relationship. And a real relationship has ups and downs and lots of compromise. Just reading over this article I have a feeling either the author is not aware of that but doesn’t want to put in the effort because it’s too exciting to pick up and trash other people, even though she portrays herself as the victim
1
I’ll take 86 great books over 86 men any day of the week.
198
@Jan
I'm with you Jan! Having gone on several dates via online sites or set up by friends, I have only once not wished I had stayed home with a book instead. And that one interesting person ghosted me! Needless to say, I am well stocked up on great books & am leaving dating behind me.
7
I'm so glad I could be the 86th person to recommend this comment.
2
Same goes for books versus certain women.
It's all about expectations. If you go into it looking for a soul mate, then as many have pointed out, you will likely be disappointed. But similar to the author I have met TONS of interesting people - not necessarily compatible, but interesting, and have learned a lot about myself in the process.
Maybe I also benefit from the fact that like the author I've been married (checked that life "box") and also have a kid (check). So there's less of an end game and I can enjoy the experience of meeting new people.
Even the best sales people don't close every deal, so one needs to develop a thick(er) skin for the online game. Ghosting, not responding in the first place, etc are all acceptable behaviour - just move on to the next. In the same vein (guys, I'm talking to you in particular) don't be MEAN. It's not worth it. If it's not a match, move on. Don't take it personally. The stories I have heard from women about spurned men....oy
And, if you do meet the person of your dreams, great!
6
self-dehumanization.
9
I tried online dating on three different sites and I could write a pretty funny book about what an awful experience it was, from the woman who pretty much did all she could but ask for my tax return to find out how much I earned on our first and only date to the ones who told me to what restaurants and resorts I was to take them and what plastic surgery I was supposed to pay for. The truth is that most of the women who responded were looking either for a meal ticket or someone who would take them to dinner, the opera etc, and be their entertainer. Good-bye to all that!
9
She was in her mid-30s at the time. I was, she said, her 42nd lover. Clearly there was no prospect for a long-term relationship there, though it took me a month to figure that out (a local farmer caught her eye). But she was a rank amateur compared to Katherine, who clearly has a low threshold for boredom along with the same love of making lists. Both were after experiences, not partners. They got what they wanted. Nothing to see here.
19
@Preston Woodruff
Your encounter with this woman is why most women and men, generally, are miserable in modern relationships.
Humans seem to be the only species that mates for pleasure and self-gratification.
Why is anyone surprised that it is found lacking on many levels.
I am convinced that many libertine types would trade their humanity to be hyper-mating primates. Of which there is only one other ironically: the Bonobo.
Hope you like bananas.
1
I'm sorry, but this still sounds like the worse kind of hell imaginable, straight out of Dante. If something ever happened to my husband, I would eat fire ants straight out of the ground before I'd subject myself to this. We all spend so much time online now, there has to be a better way for everyone.
15
Excellent article, Katharine. Very genuine, poignant and accurate as hell.
4
That was interesting, even if I found parts of it slightly creepy (the volume of men, the diary, to start with).
I met my husband around 15 years ago through match.com. When I created my profile, I wrote that I liked Golden Retrievers, cats, skiing, snowmobiling, computers, bicycling, tennis, motorcycling, sports, etc. The photo I included was of me on a frozen lake in a Carhartt jacket and sunglasses looking pretty rough. I said I'd be interested in men without children within 25 miles of my home.
A few weeks later, some guy "winked" at me. I "winked" back. We messaged through match.com. He was and remains very shy, and I was and remain very restrained and conservative. Through the messaging, we figured out that we came from similar families of origin, had similar values, and had similar lives. Eventually, we shared email addresses, and after about three weeks, we had a phone call. Then, we had a first date at an Applebee's. The next day, we got together in the morning to watch a MotoGP race at his house. We got to know one another in subsequent dates, but perhaps more from sports and activities.
Eleven months later, he proposed. We moved in together, put his house on the market, and eighteen months after we met, we were husband and wife. We still are. I never would have met him if it hadn't been for online dating. I don't go to bars, and there aren't a lot of men in the Rosary Altar Society.
15
For a while, online dating (and the constant disappointment that comes with it) depressed the hell out of me. It had me thinking I was going about life the wrong way and that my being single was an indication of who I am as a person. Not all, but most of my traumas in as an unattractive dude surrounded by more-physically-attractive people (i.e. getting insulted for taking up a space at a bar or restaurant tables by couples on dates) and resulting negative self-esteem came out of my pores in an attempt to smother me.
But with some introspection and ongoing psychotherapy, I was able to identify and pick-off some serious negative thoughts and began to build up actual reasons why who I am now is more than "good enough". And "good enough" not so much in the sense of attracting an intimate romantic relationship, but "good enough" to have a fine life regardless of my relationship status. I realized that who I really am and pursuing the non-relationship-dependent interests is the real marrow of life.
I do miss dates, but I get basically the same experience being with friends and trying new places, and meeting new people in the process. I still swipe, but recognize that most everyone on dating apps are either liars or straight-up garbage people. Perhaps a diamond in rough will reveal itself in my walk through life, but I'm not gonna be on my knees in the dirt looking desperately for her; not when there's a beautiful enough world I can enjoy just by being in it.
22
Wonderful article giving me a different, positive take on what has been a less than positive experience for me. You showed the warm humanity that can be exposed by a little openness.
But holy crap...the judging reflected in some of these comments! Lighten up people! The comments remind me why I’m no longer dating online, not your article.
10
Had we used online dating, me and my spouse of 30 years (including 2 children) would never have met. She was vegetarian, liberal, and a dedicated athlete. He loved steak, Reagan, and was an avid fan of tennis (only on TV); he was also married.
She never wanted a second date; he just wanted an affair.
But by the next date (which she tried to decline), they realised that they had very much in common: both were scientists, atheists, and open-minded to other cultures. They educated one-another (he became an actual tennis player and vegetarian), and she learned about his childhood under a communist government.
Don't give up too quickly on a person: there is NO perfect match. Look for the qualities that can be nurtured, massaged (not in the Epstein meaning) and loved.
7
After my divorce, I used a dating app... I met one lady for a hike and she walked up to me and said, "Hello number 7." Naturally, this led me to ask... what that number signified... I was the 7th male she had seen since her husband unexpectedly passed (just before his retirement). We had a good hike, talking about this and that... and at the end of the hike... she said she wanted to see me again... and I said... NO... not because I was #7 but because she was still using #6 for various chores (he came over and repaired her hot water heater, etc.) I suggested that she should focus on #6 who was showing loyalty, support and dependability. That was that...
9
Fascinating article! Loving the author's embrace of diversity in dating all these different men. For myself, I've been happily polyamorous for 15 years, and the enthusiasm seems similar. The odd thing is, I've never online dated - somehow, wonderful people seem to show up in sufficient quantity in real life, and for some reason that baffles me, some of them show an interest in me. But my advice is to keep doing things that you enjoy, and enjoy them; people are attracted to that genuineness. I prefer irl things, but if online dating is that thing you enjoy, go for it.
2
Way too many comments attacking the author for having met 86 guys in 3 years. That is not at all abnormal for a woman her age.
Also, in general, online dating is much harder on women than on men. The combination of Viagra and these dating apps have created a huge power imbalance in favor of men. I know really attractive and intelligent women who can’t find anything beyond casual hookups on these apps. Meanwhile most (but not all) guys I know, regardless of age, financial status or looks are having the time of their lives with a seemingly infinite stream of new sexual partners.
10
Want to know how to succeed at online dating and find lasting love? Be friends first. Spend three months just being friends. I’ve been spared ghosting for the most part, but I have not been spared men believing they are available but not being able to cope when conflicts arise. Being just friends for three months gives you a chance to see what the other person’s life is really like and whether you really want to be a part of it. If he’s a good guy he’ll say what mine did, “I’d love to be your friend for three months.” Sign me, happily ever after.
5
You have to be cold-hearted and shallow to cycle through people like this, or at least that’s how it strikes me, but then again I’m alone!
9
I eat in restaurants alone. This has given me experience in online dating.
Often enough, I'm sitting near people who are meeting up for the first time. I'm not trying to overhear the conversation, but ...
Some conversations sound like LinkedIn profiles read aloud. "I thought about getting a Ph.D."
Some conversations are entirely one-sided. After a while, you can tell that one party has fully retreated.
But my favorites, I think, are the total mismatches. This is when two people realize this is going nowhere. And then they have fun, order some drinks, appetizers and laugh about their online dating adventures.
31
I found online dating to be a continually repeating experience in masochism; and I found Carrie's article to be the same. If she finds it enlivening to have her air conditioner stolen- well, there are no words.
12
86.
That is the number that got my attention. Were these “dates”? Were these extended conversations? Were these interviews?
And “sheepskin sex”.
Clearly, dating this writer means you get interviewed for “sexual compatibility”, the modern era’s most laughable trope that sends people with no true intimacy into life’s most intimate act.
I am also intrigued by 9 years a partner. It seems that perhaps the step across the marriage threshold was more of a transaction, like the 86 dates, and less of a covenantal inalterable fusing of lives.
Women are now two things, neither supportive of their heartfelt interests. First, they are sexual objects who go on birth control at younger ages and provide all that a man could want long before there has been evidence of sacrifice and commitment. Second, the fight for economic power has divided the world into two camps: the utterly professional and the desperately struggling. If women still want to bear children, and a demonstrable number do, it is largely incompatible with singlehood. That is, if sanity is a shared goal.
Love has been hi-jacked by the movies. Where the Greeks had four (or more) words for love, dating singles have a hazy lens that generally passes first through Eros.
Men and women ARE different. And men’s disenchantment with dating apps will be far less melancholy than this piece.
Men and women should start with a ten-question survey that plumbs belief systems, life goals, and commitment to lifetime monogamy. Not sex.
6
Hope springs eternal but this seems like an exhausting laundry list! No info on emotional cost for either party And in my humble opinion a waste of time...
7
Never give up. If you want something bad enough, keep trying until you find what you are looking for.
Excellent article.
2
@Chad - Yes Chad, give up. In an earlier life I was like you suggested and kept on. Here’s the money quote for persisting, “if at first you don’t succeed, lower your standards.”
Date after date with women who were so unsuitable, in large numbers, ground me down to where I took the first one who was intelligent and had style. Big mistake... huge error.
Thus I say, give up trying but don’t give up your standards.
This article is entertaining and light-hearted, describing 86 failed dates as mini-adventures. So many dates in three years, with such a wide variety of guy types! Rejection and ghosting are apparently the norm in the online dating world, but apparently served to strengthen this woman's character and her path to self knowledge. Also of course the 86 dates served as subject matter for this article. But in reality, for those who are lonely and really seeking connection, the journey as described here would be utterly soul-crushing.
8
I will write this post and likely no one will listen. Still, here goes. After trying a number of dating apps and failing miserably for years to find someone, I drew it upon myself to finally try deep meditation. I also forgave all my past relationships with women.
it was only after I released all need to find my soul mate did the perfect woman appear into my life. We've been happily married for eleven years now.
It may sound trite but it is true, people. You have to learn first to love yourself first. Meditation is the way. Open yourself up to divine love and the universe will eventually fall into place.
43
Great comment and deeply truthful. Requires more effort than a thumb swipe but oh so much more rewarding.
9
If I was ghosted this often by so many people -- including my former spouse -- I would seriously start to wonder if the problem was me.
21
As a dating coach, I really like this article. So many people only view the negative, but the reality of it is that you can meet such a broad spectrum of people online. I also happen to like that it points out that marriage isn’t necessarily the best, or only, end goal — happiness is.
17
Thanks Erika, your insight is always welcome!
I am 65 and have been online dating since my marriage ended in '96. I have come to terms about being single the rest of my life and guess what its not bad. Online dating has become more of a place to network for me and expand my social life. I have no expectations with the people I meet online and like the author find the journey an adventure. One online date has turned into a lifelong friend who I swap apartments with in Paris every year. Others have turned into job opportunities since I am self employed. As they say you never know who you will meet. Just go for it.
16
I began online dating in my early forties, divorced & mother to a daughter I was blessed with by donor insemination. I had a short window after divorce to have a child and a long window to find a partner. I didn’t think of ever marrying again, thought I’d be lucky if I found a friend .... I was rejected many times based on a disfiguring facial scar. I dated three men. The third is a kind, intelligent, loving man; we celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary last month. We know how fortunate we are: two adult daughters, a granddaughter and a blended family. Oh, & it turns out we lived a tiny town away in California when I was 9 and he was 14 (Pacific Grove & Monterey) in 1966!
7
I’m in my 50s. When I was in my 20s, I had a friend who would drop boyfriends the moment they exhibited any of the many minor flaws all of us have as members of the human race. She said she wanted to marry and have children; she is still single. Online dating has only amplified the tendency of many women to ignore and swipe past the average, good hearted Joes who might make wonderful life partners. This writer, who seems to sniff at the sweet gesture of “gas station roses” purchased in the early morning of a bitterly cold day, fits in that category.
18
Skillful writing. I sure would hate, however, to date someone like her, as she seems more interested in material for her work than genuine human connection.
Hers is the kind of superficial behaviour we (at least my generation, i.e. boomer) used to deplore in men. Imagine the outcry were such an article written by a man boasting of romantic conquests. Perhaps she secretly rates them on a scale of one to ten.
My heart went out to the boat builder, whose gallantry and kindness the writer seems to take as a feather in her cap rather than evidence of what a "find" he surely is.
Perhaps the dating sites should publish the numbers of dates people have been on. Then those who like to flit from one "interesting person" to another could stick together.
Yes, be bold and date and meet people, but do not treat them as accessories to your ego. This is not, I hope, the way forward.
49
My experience with on-line dating is similar to the authors in the following respect: on-line dating is great for assisting with loneliness and physical intimacy. For me (and I am not saying for everyone), on-line dating is a problematic way to achieve long-term emotional intimacy. Not a fan. I’m happily married for 12 years...met my wife at a national symposium the old fashion way... I went up to her and said “hi.”
1
Online dating is like democracy and marriage, both terribly flawed institutions but we have not come up with anything better yet.
In my earlier days I was much more successful with it than other methods.
4
I've done it, although not to the compulsive, mind bending extent of the author. I thought I met a nice woman and we dated for a year. She was nuts. I caught her reading my email going back months and months. I'm not dating anyone now, off the site(s) and find that I'm not missing it at all.
3
More from the online dating "Art of the Cliché Profile -- Women's Department": So many women boast of their ability to go from flats to heels effortlessly. In all of my decades on the planet I've never once heard a guy -- anywhere in real life, in a book, or in a movie -- talk about his search to find women who can rock both a pair of Nikes *and* heels. We're, er, much simpler than that. Proof that if men are from Mars, Women are from Manolo Blahnik.
2
Compared to most men I’ve read about I did fairly well at on line dating, but I quit. I have done on line dating in my 40’s and now, 20ish years later on. It’s better if you are younger, but it is exhausting at any age and soul destroying when older. It is the endless interview for a job you don’t want, or aren’t qualified to do; or worse, are perfect do but never get the call back.
The author of this piece is surfing and has no idea how deep the water is that she glides over. She is representative of the numberless women I met who brought nothing to the table save for inflated expectations and a desire to judge me and my life. It is from women such as her that I learned to lie on dates to protect my self esteem from their 240 second judgments. You can’t ghost someone who was never there in the first place I’ve learned.
On line the eye wants what the eye wants. Like dogs we chase that which retreats, and on occasion catch the proverbial car. But the tires are bald, the engine runs crazy hot, plus it’s low on gas. Oh, and the gas is your life’s blood.
23
@KxS Thanks, you made me snort my coffee.
The idea of dating anyone that I found online is just not appealing to me. The internet is a place where anyone can invent anything about themselves and to me that is dangerous.
10
A picture and perhaps the age of this person would have helped but my guess was late 20s to early thirties and good looking but if your older and not so good looking your better off at the library or your local Starbucks. Doormat dating is what I call it. At the end of the experience your dignity and self esteem feel like the doormat of the laundromat. When you and the other onlame,ers decide that only a fitted glove will do. Thing is men want women with sex appeal and women want men with bank appeal. Sometimes it all comes together. More often it don’t. Like most things internet based, it helps to be young and not yesterdays slice of pizza. Hey it’s a jungle out there.
5
I recommend online dating as it exposes you to so many people that you would have never met otherwise. Yes, it can be mortifying. Advertising to the world that I was single and had not found someone face to face was far out of my comfort zone. I was very honest with myself and in my profiles about what I wanted and did not want. Because of this I stayed single for longer but found what I wanted in the end. I had some women message me and some women that I messaged with about a 50% response rate. I’m no looker but I do have an education and I write and text in full sentences (no “u look hot” or “c u l8er babe”) which women seemed to find attractive. No shirtless or worse photos. No blathering on about myself ad infinitum. No creepy sexual innuendos. We had great conversations and I went on dates with about ten women over about a two year period; most of the dates were forgettable yet I did eventually meet my life partner a little over four years ago. I encourage online daters to cast a wide net but to be true to themselves. Take your time, do not settle, and you may find who you are looking for. Good luck!
23
What beautiful writing! Thank you! You have a real gift.
1
I’m less intrigued by this piece than annoyed by it. Sure, online dating is soul-destroying, as the author so aptly describes, but look, she survived! Such interesting fodder for her writing career! Which is exactly how this reads to me. The usual litany of interesting types she’s met, “... dated German poets and Indian bankers, Australian contractors and Brazilian waiters.” Really? Multiple German poets and Indian bankers? More than one Australian contractor? Many Brazilian waiters? Then a touching anecdote or two for a few men who particularly stood out.
Pet peeve of mine, but that sounds like a list for “look how interesting my life has become”. I saw not one iota of feeling/introspection/growth regarding how or why her marriage failed, and that’s really none of our business unless she wants to tell us about it, or what she’s learned about herself/life/the world/people after her divorce. In the end, it feels like a laundry list of interesting experiences but nothing more.
64
Thanks for that. Excellent.
It was easier in the old country
Your parents introduced you to your spouse.
End of story.
3
I’d love to see a similar article written from the perspective of an average-looking straight male.
10
oh the tales I can tell from my online dating days...first dates:
the bank robber (36 of them!)
the tug boat operator who cried when I told him I didn't think it was a "match"
the slob who grabbed me by the "lady parts"
the nice guy with the trichotillomania
the chronic farter
the sociopath who asked to borrow money on the first date
and those were the nice ones.
5
@Angela right, a working man who cries is as bad as bank robbers, sociopaths and molesters. Got it.
Katharine, after 86 different guys, maybe its time for you to give up your online dating accounts. At least you can save money. You have sampled enough variety, maybe you are just difficult to please or have a high standard.
I have dated several women who claimed they were independent professionals but not one offered to pick up the check...
4
@Gary Valan
So true. Most women, having little money, are just looking for a free meal. I took a woman I met online to dinner and instantly realized she was not for me. We ate, I asked for the check and when the waiter brought it she asked me if she could have another glass of wine. I apparently made a face because #1 I didn't want to spend another minute with this woman, and #2 I didn't want to spend another dime on this woman. Thinking that I would embarassed and break down and get her the wine, she said "that's ok I'll buy my own wine since you apparently don't want to get it for me". But she had no money and so went wineless.
2
Haha! That’s exactly what I tried to do
Many times but it did not go well thanks to make stereotypes and low self esteem.
Meeting strange men and going on 86 dates. Seriously? Ms.Smyth’s online dating experiences doesn’t sound like an “adventure” to me it is more like reckless and dangerous.
12
Bravo, well written and wonerful experienences. I m with you. Never done on line dating but like your strength and williness to go ahead an continue finding yourself in the highs and lows.
This essay sounds like the skeleton treatment of at least 50 TV movies I've seen. Woman seeking adventure meets superficially charming, good-looking man with yacht through an online dating app. She winds up: drugged and in a literal hole until she dies (undiscovered); drugged and murdered, her corpse dressed by her Thursday night date as his dead grandmother; tossed from a yacht by a serial killer, because he felt the need for just one more, y'know? And on and on.
To the point "IRL": Never does this writer mention safety as a concern. Ever. Unbelievable.
19
Beautifully penned.
WHO badmouths online dating?
It’s obviously the best aspect of the internet revolution...Who doesn’t have friends or relatives who met their partners via online dating?
OK Cupid is an American institution! In my mid 40s I met my life mate via this site at the end of the most interesting and sexually-promiscuous year of my life...Dated many women 20 years younger than me and women 10 years older! After a while I realized age didn’t matter, looks didn’t matter, no factual info mattered ...I “approved” every single woman because in reality every person was different than their online profile...Often more compelling...
I thought my college years were sexually insane but my OK Cupid year in my mid 40s made my collegiate escapades seem positively puritanical...
I’ve been with my final OK Cupid date for eight years...and I’m glad that all our online communications are documented for eternity...
All single folks looking for love should take advantage of online dating...
3
Online dating is a waste of time and money. It took me a while for me to realize that.
Whenever I think about resuming it I remind myself “Ok Stupid!”
that’s it.
Mike
3
Ha!!! When I did it years ago it was a total waste of time.
3
So, the author's husband left her. She decides her revenge would be to date around as much as possible. She documents her exploits all in an effort to wrote a book. I'm going to guess that the author lives in Brooklyn. This is all so cliche.
16
Does anyone actually care about these contrived adventures?
12
@sedanchair
No ... she could get more out of going to the bathroom.
2
Ladies just work with this premise.
All men are dogs.
Now go to work.
9
Some helpful tips for online dating...
If you're a woman:
1. Be under 40.
2. Be slim.
3. Be pretty.
4. If none of the above apply to you, state an interest in a "no-drama" physical relationship; you will be inundated with suitors within 5 minutes.
If you're a man:
1. Be under 50.
2. Be at least 5'11".
3. Mention your Ivy League degree, your love of exotic travel, and apologize in advance for the fact that as a surgeon you are often on call.
4. Do not send unrequested pictures of your anatomy.
5. If a woman says she is interested in a "no-drama" physical relationship, she is either lying or not talking about you.
9
This is soooo true. I found the exact same thing. There is no other way on Earth to get to meet and get to know people with such ease. And because it’s a dating app, people want to share much more deeply than if you became acquainted another way. (I mean emotionally and personally too—not just the “bad” way, you dirty minders! ;)
All tools have downsides. A kitchen knife can murder! But your article really points up very poetically how unique and world-changing the “Tinders” of the world really are.
2
I found online dating the worst possible way of meeting women: except for all others. How does sitting at a bar, listening to drunks howl at stupid jokes strike you? Happy hours where you can't hear yourself think? Church, where people are just as cliqueish and judgemental as anywhere else? Online dating will definitely lead you to the very important reassessment: maybe you aren't the fantastic catch you thought you were. And maybe you should reconsider you standards about possible future partners.
3
I’m curious as to why her partner after 9 years snuck out in the middle of the night to escape from her.
She’s a writer.
86 dates in 3 years is not “seeing the world.”
Quality over quantity means something.
It’s true though that in the most attractive dating cities majority of singles feel they a dating app.
So 7 dating apps later...
After several app dates, who wants to see the world through their biased eyes?
5
I was divorced after 23 years of marriage. I am fairly media savvy but had no interest in online dating, for a host of reasons. One day I got on a plane for a business trip and an attractive woman sat down next to me. After about ten minutes she took out a sleeve of Fig Newtons, which happen to be my favorite cookie. I asked her for one, which led to a second and conversation. We've been together ever since, for several years, and are very much in love.
I write this not to support or denigrate online dating. Rather, my point is that there are people everywhere if you are open to taking a chance and starting a conversation. You don't need Wifi and electrons to make that happen. And if there is no reciprocity to your advance, well, you're no worse off than before you took that risk. Rejection doesn't mean you've failed; it only means you haven't succeeded just yet.
13
For those with eyes to see and an openness to what is unfolding, life whatever its circumstances, is filled with adventure.
3
Online dating companies like Tinder are free-market enterprises. Their goal is to maximize profit, if they don’t, they will go out of business. Profit is generated through advertising revenues, that is the more time users spend on Tinder and the like, the more money the company makes selling users’ personal data.
Tinder is sophisticatedly engineered to keep one swiping for as much time as possible. Were the company to quickly and effectively match people up it would quickly go out of business. There’s nothing wrong with people enjoying casual dates, but one should be transparent about what dating ups are designed for.
10
Try being a 70-something, financially independent, travel-loving, tennis-playing, ballroom-dancing female with most, if not all, of her marbles. Then imagine the really decrepit 85+-year old males looking for a 'companion' or the 40-somethings looking for a meal ticket, which are the 'matches' that have been made for me, and you can see why online dating is not my thing. Even though the aging population would seem to indicate that seniors should be a large part of the online market, active men who would be a good match for me seem as ever to want pretty and much younger women. Online sites are not worth the bother to me, which I consider a loss for those who might meet me as much as for myself.
16
Worked for me- and when I got divorced years ago, I went on various sites- yes lots of women, lots of good women (but not good for me and vice versa, but what the heck!). But what is the alternative? Bars, work, church/temple? At least on the dating sites, you know they are single (hopefully) and looking. And you know things like age, spirituality, children, pets, some information from their profiles, etc. And yes, I am with a fabulous woman that I met online a while ago and she is as close to a soulmate as I have met. But nobody is perfect
4
Oh, please. I tried one of the Internet-based "dating sites" over 20 years ago, when I was new to city on the USA's west coast. Fun for a few months. I met some nice women, but never again after those few months.
It is a sick venue for interacting with other people. It is one of the many elements of the disgusting and rapid decent into the gutter of the wonders that otherwise are made available by vast interconnected electronic networks. So-called "social media" are the dregs of the earth, much like 99.9% of television programming.
1
I want to hear more about that husband who disappeared in the night.
54
Yes, it can enlarge your world. So can putting down your electronic device and walking outside.
14
I thought this was a wonderful piece of writing.
7
Oh gosh. What incredibly beautiful prose, the flow of your words, the pictures you paint , the flow of your life. I believe every word is yours and reflects who you are in the multiple ways you have moved me and legitimately seduced me and likely many more men to set the stage to fall in love. At this virtual moment, at the very least I’d want you as a friend for life, for very few women I have known in my long life have your ability to so quickly reveal your inside out beauty.
Until we meet. Will your outer beauty & style resemble my perception of your inner? Romantically?Hopefully. But as great and as deep a guy as I am , as incredibly brilliant and passionate & compassionate you surely are—like other choosy judgmental immature men, my shallow nature might rule based on your physical appeal. I might take your number but may not call . For that reason I’ve been an outside in socializer - when looking to fall in love or deep like. At live social events where I can see, & screen out whose depth I’d like to explore. Not online. Of course that can fail. But I’m fine, & have known romantic love, over years of a multiple married and single life. 9 loving grandkids make it all moot
2
Oh boy, where do I start? Been dating for nearly four years after my wife of 23 years passed away. Like the author, online dating has opened me to meeting people I would never have had the pleasure of meeting. Frankly, I find the entire experience extremely interesting.
But, I would say that at least half of the people I "meet" online disappear after several texts and way before meeting in person. Then there are the people who lie about their ages, often by five to 10 years and always for "search purposes only." And, many do not look at all like their pictures, are looking only for a free meal, talk about how much money their ex-husbands owe them and how most men are evil. I can't forget about the women who still with their ex's.
Every once in a while, I find someone who I think is a winner. But most of the time all that means is the issues do not come out until the third or fourth date. Most recently, one divorced woman told me on the third date that she told her 17 year old daughter that she met someone. The child's reaction: "If he comes here, I will kill him."
Hmmmm...lots of fun in the big city
10
86 different men in three years! That's about one every two weeks! Ms. Smyth, it seems, is hard to please.
Dating, so blythe and carefree for a woman, can be an expensive proposition for a man. I wonder if Ms. Smyth expected the men she describes to do the inviting and the planning, whether they paid for the dinners, drinks, wine and travel, and whether she ever offered to do her bit on these matters. Unless she did, Ms. Smyth would seem to view online dating as a way to be wined, dined, showered with gifts and brought to lovely places, all for the sheer pleasure of her company, in effect a one-way street.
There used to be a word for women like that. But she writes about it much better than most.
22
@pspiegel. A friend of mine went on a date with a woman he met online and at dinner she ordered a meal for that evening and another for takeaway with the expectation that he pay for it. He went to the "restroom" and snuck out!
8
I'd rather eat bugs than date 86 women in such a short time, or maybe even in my whole life. Then again I'm an introvert who enjoys my own company maybe even too much. Blaise Cendrars weren't no William Blake, who was married and hardly ever left London. Being imaginatively present to the simple things right in front of your nose can be the biggest adventure of all.
19
I have been a confirmed Ladies Man on both coasts with online dating and have met many wonderful Ladies.
One of the most poignant dates was a slender blonde beauty who actually was legally blind (I did not know until later). She txted when her cab was arriving and asked me for my arm and we walked to the dim lounge.
I ordered for both of us; and she held my arm tight all night until we went back to my place. She then told me she lost her sight as a child and couldn’t see; and didn’t know what I looked like.
I made us a gourmet dinner and she asked where the food was on the plate by hour. We had wonderful conversation; and surprisingly plenty of intimacy at her request.
She texted the next day and said she slept like a baby and it was a wonderful night; and she wanted to keep it at that.
I truly felt like a human being and like I had seen godliness on earth.
Will never forget it.
25
It felt like a gift because intimacy is a gift. When we expose ourselves to another, even in the flesh, in kind and loving ways, even for just an instant, we banish loneliness and anxiety. It takes a huge amount of courage to give and accept. I don’t know you bro, but something tells me we could be friends. And ladies, that’s all you need to know... he’s one of the good guys.
2
Online dating is one of the most depressing activities I've engaged in. As a gregarious introvert I really like the idea but I can count the responses to emails sent on one hand over a period of years. My honest profile states accurately that I'm 5'6" but many profiles of intelligent potential matches based on personality and common interests clearly state I must be at least 6 foot. The real world is much kinder but at my age in my 40s pickins are getting slim, and yes I am looking for somebody my own age! I do a lot of overseas traveling and I don't quite understand how I can have little flings with mostly European hotties in their twenties while traveling but nothing but crickets and games from average looking women my own age back in the States. Sigh...
8
With all of those twenty-something "hotties" quite eager and willing to have flings with your forty-something self, perhaps moving to Europe is the answer to your romantic woes. Sigh...
I don't have anything insightful, funny or touching to say about online dating, but I really enjoyed this piece of writing at the end:
Every so often I looked out the window at the river, where strange white tendrils were rising and whipping in sheets across the surface. Sea smoke, I later learned, occurring when bitter air sweeps over warmer waters, and it held me spellbound, for I had never seen such a thing before.
Thank you for this.
10
After a 10 year marriage, followed by divorce, I waited to date four to five years: My kids were very young, my career was beginning to peak and I really wanted to focus on my kids and my career. Once my children reached their late teens, I began to think about dating again. I went out, joined clubs, took hobby and other interest classes, organized outings with friends, I wasn't meeting anyone! Fruitless and futile!
I then signed up to an online dating site, wasn't cheap, and I immediately met some great men and some not so honest men. Then, on the day this membership was set to expire, this service alerted me to a profile of a fun, intelligent and quirky man. We talked, we met. Our first date started on a Friday and ended on Sunday evening when we both realized we both had to get to work on Monday. We have been married for years now, and he is an amazing partner, husband, friend.
Here's what I'm trying to say, at some point, meeting someone is as much science as it is serendipity, or more science or more serendipity, depending on who you are. I enjoyed the article, but mostly enjoyed the others comments, a window into human relationships in today's world!
31
As someone who entered the world of computer dating in 2001, I can testify that the dating world of folks in their forties was always interesting, frequently entertaining, and sometimes bizarre. It also changed my life, as on January 4, 2003, I met the woman who was to become my wife.
By the way, I'm by no means a matinee idol. My strengths were my honesty (Vital when meeting women who have been dumped by their husbands for twenty-something blondes.), and my sense of humor. In response to the profile question, "What's the first thing someone would notice about you when you first meet?", many people answered with comments about their dazzling smiles or bluer-than-blue eyes. My response? "The cat hair on my clothes."
18
My experience with online dating is nothing like this. I'm lucky if someone swipes back. And I never a movie star's ex or diplomats or boat builders!
Also, I guess I'm just not good enough for women. I am not at all a German poet or Indian banker. I would not fly to Jamaica on the third date, that is way too soon. Even the who Dunkin’ Donuts and a dozen red roses thing struck me as something I would never too. I get you have to be a bit romantic. But what this woman describes sounds like dating 86 of the ultimate romantic fantasy guys. I am a nice, charming guy with a good career and even then I don't think in a million years I could measure up to what this woman experienced. That must be why I'm single. Is this REALLY what women expect??
Honestly, this woman sounds a bit like she used 86 guys for a big romantic adventure. It doesn't sound like she was looking for something serious, more like something fun and adventurous.
31
Is there anything wrong with seeking adventure if everyone is informed of the goal?
41
@R.D. Well, in some sense no, if everyone is on the same page and is doing things for the right reasons, then an adventurous fling isn't wrong. But that's a pretty big "if".
I tend to think that long term relationships are much healthier than short flings. The author seems to have some unresolved issues from her divorce and dating 86 guys is more a distraction than a way to deal with the issues. Also, the author seemed to get only the honeymoon phase and I think the valuable part of dating/relationships is getting to know someone really well and the work of negotiating a shared life with another person. I don't think the author really cared about these guys, she was just having fun, and that's a bit disappointing.
Moreover, for me personally, I don't think I'd enjoy seeking adventure. I'm very laidback and introverted, I'd find planning big romantic dates exhausting. Long term I just want one good woman who loves me for me, as do most guys I know. I just want someone to cuddle and watch Netflix with. Part of my concern is a lot of women in their 30s seem to want the big romantic adventure more than a relationship, whereas me and other guys actually want a relationship.
I suppose I could as the reverse: Is there anything wrong with a mundane "heteronormative" relationship? Because that's what I want.
5
I, too, am an introvert, and l hear you. All l want is to find one good man to love and be loved by, and it just seems impossible. Our experiences are a bit different in that the men l know aren't really interested in having a relationship while the women are, but the point is that there seems to be a good number of men and women who are yearning to have a deep, committed relationship with a good, loving person. More than anything in the world, we want someone to walk hand-in-hand with through life, and we just can't find each other. Even with all of the technology that should (or perhaps I should say could) make it easier for us to find each other, so many of us don't and we just continue to walk on alone.
3
It's easy to see from this article why the online dating world is so aristocratic. One good looking woman can date and tie-up 90 men within 3 years. Many men who might have settled for a stable relationship with a less attractive woman years ago now will try his luck with the top 10% and feel it worth it if he gets lucky every few months. I bet the top 10% of men will do even better. All the benefits of polygamy without any of the costs in the commitment of time and resources!
22
@ett
Your hypothesis has been confirmed by network analysis on real data, done by one of the top people in that field. Bingo!
1
@ett
Your hypothesis has been confirmed by network analysis on real data, done by one of the top people in that field. Bingo!
As total connections in a network go up, those rich in connections get disproportionately richer.
As a player on and off line...you are still just another player another number among many players who are mostly younger, richer, fit, and witty than you are.
Yes, you find meaning in unexpected places but you also find it where you last expected to find it...even at home with the one who cared enough to give it their best...and then I realized that I was satisfied.
7
I learned an analogy from childcare - someone you don't know and haven't met before can become your BFF today
if you don't see them again that's OK - because there'll be others whose company you can enjoy, as they yours
last week I changed the day I went to childcare, and was met as they arrived with a surprise cry from the most extroverted, who I hadn't seen for months. She immediately came over and gave me a hug, asked how I was, and kept walking in.
Later during the craft activities, she saw me standing behind her, turned around and gave me a long tight hug. No words. Just happy to see you.
Form the Male perspective, two can play this game, and I have.
I was a typical clean cut NYC Bachelor who had a good job, suit, watch and apartment, and paid for cosmos, dinners, birthdays,
Vacations ad nauseam. All this resulted in 20 successful “relationships” in two decades.
With online dating, the tables are turned. I only agree to one drink close by, pick the youngest and prettiest and am open / direct about intimacy immediately. In last 5 years, I have had 100+ “relationships”.
Not a womanizer; just strategic. My resultant soaring bank/investment account, career, health and non-existent divorce, alimony, child support, and mini-van bills are proof positive.
“Quantity has a quality all its own.”
5
Fabulous piece written by what sounds like a fabulous, unabashed, life-loving woman. To go from a locked down marriage to the tastes Katharine mentions in this piece is refreshing and downright exhilarating. (Yeah, wedlock IS a padlock - for many of us.)
Count me as another one inspired by her tenacity and lust for life!
11
After that account, my guess is after around blind date 96, boring should start to seem attractive.
10
I'd like to think that if I'd gone out with 86 women I'd have more than one friend for life. But perhaps I'm not so extraordinarily demanding.
8
The author jumps from “When I was in my early 30s, my husband of four years, partner of nine, left abruptly in the middle of the night” directly to the topic of online dating. What?
I am so very intrigued (not sure why) at what happened in her previous relationship that is obviously still affecting her now. Being a writer I would have guessed she has written about this but I’m finding nothing.
29
Wow! I'm almost convinced to get back into online dating. I canceled my membership after several months of being matched to women whose wanted nothing more exciting than to curl up and watch a movie. I've found very few people online with any intellectual curiosity or sense of adventure. Maybe I should move :).
8
@Grover19
I hear you. I’m retired early and love to travel. Since I’ve met so many great people and made good friends doing that, I know they’re out there... but apparently not too many on match.com. Once a year to the Caribbean is not enough. I can’t bring myself to cancel the subscription yet because you never know, but I didn’t guess it’d be so difficult. In the meantime I keep going, off to Indonesia next month. Here’s to better luck for both of us!
3
@Grover19 "I canceled my membership after several months of being matched to women whose wanted nothing more exciting than to curl up and watch a movie."
Oh, my goodness! Those women sound like my ultimate romantic fantasy! That's all I want, to curl up with someone and watch a movie. I love movies and I love women, what more does one need?
All the women I see on online date say they want an activity partner and enjoy the outdoors and hiking. I really do just want a beautiful woman to watch movies with. I can't seem to find her.
(And the planning the adventurous dates Katharine went on sounds exhausting!)
How do I meet those women? Like, where do you live? What website did you use? Are women picky about height on there (I'm not 6'0")? I need a membership immediately. Please train me Yoda.
4
This wonderful and beautifully composed piece of writing brought back many memories. I explored online dating for about five years and it changed my life for the better. I met many wonderful women who I would have otherwise never have met had it not been for Match.com, Plenty of fish, etc.
I fell in love, had my heart broken, and learned what “ghosting was” before I knew the term. I’ve dated doctors, lawyers, teachers, a psychologist, writers, artists, a university dean, architects, police officers, a poet laureate, geeks, a witch, professors, and scores of other incredibly beautiful and interesting souls who I would have otherwise never met.
I remain close with several of these friends and very close with one. I’ve experienced things I would never otherwise have experienced had I not met these women. Rowing on the Schuylkill River, attending pagan festivals, yoga, performing in community Shakespeare performances, singing, dancing on stage to an audience of thousands, learning to play the guitar, and cycling at night under the moonlight.
Online dating opened my otherwise narrow view of the world. I had no idea that there were so many parallel universes to the one in which I was living.
I recommend that anyone reading this try online dating. Cast aside your fears and inhibitions. Be ready to get your heart broken. Approach the adventure keeping your eyes open to stay safe - but most of all, open your heart and listen to what other people have to say.
38
this is basically the womans version of the piece ive been meaning to write for a few yrs. I had a few less dates, clocking in at 70. I was on a mission. Okcupid,Tinder and Bumble brought me times sad, scary crazy and funny. And a whole lot of boring as well. But i did find her in the end And Im a very lucky man today, almost 4 yrs later.
7
Dating apps deserve no praise. They are bad for men...and women..and all human beings. All one needs to do is to remember of how people met before those swiping apps...introduced by married friends, or someone at work, perhaps at church, or even a bar. It was always face to face. No inaccurate pictures and someone helping to write the "best" profile. The prospect of being able to date 50 or 100 people was dim (twenty years ago!), and maybe for good reason. When auntie set up a couple both knew there was something there. If "she" wanted an athlete and "he" was pudgy, he just might change, Relationships took time, not swipes. There was no ghosting, none at all. Ghosting, bread-crumbing and the rest of those bad behaviors weren't just bad manners, or emotional cruelty, but non existent. If someone "ghosted" the police might be called, or there was a missing persons report. Before praising online dating, consider statistics for the 20 and 30 somethings: no sex, no real dating, no marriage, no family, but lots and lots of money given to those dating apps. And face it, if those apps actually worked, and people met their someone in a few months, they would loose money. Those companies make a tidy sum by stringing would be daters along with algorithms that just don't work. So there, online dating is a horrific experience...for humanity.
12
Got to disagree. I met the love of my life online. Yes this was preceded by a couple of years of online dating that didn’t really go anywhere, and I didn’t date 86 people, but for the most part they were decent men and I think these experiences led me to recognize “the one” when I met him. Don’t take the whole process too personally and keep busy with other activities in the meantime.
7
86 and counting?
Sounds like the author has a real need to be loved. Many people are able to find this in real life, not a classified. I wonder what the headcount is for people to hook up with people that they know.
6
You are paying to go on dates. Not going on 86 dates after 3 years of paying a fee would be a complete waste of funds. Same if you were to join a 70s style matchmaking blind date service.
1
Being a very busy professional, but realizing that I needed a woman I could trust to keep my mental stability, I went through thousands of photos on an online dating website over a weekend as soon as I arrived in China. Found about 10 who looked promising. Went on 5 coffee dates in 3 weeks that lasted no more than 30 minutes. There was clearly no attraction at lest on my side. The 6th was the charm. We dated for a few months before she moved in. We have known each other for 10 years now, and it’s been good. Been married for 7 and parents to a wonderful daughter for 5. Maybe I was lucky. Or maybe I was just careful and thorough. Maybe I finally figured out who I wanted to be with after a very stressful marriage and divorce to a beautiful woman with borderline personality disorder and a couple of unhappy relationships afterwards. All made me think carefully about who I was and who I needed. Being in China where women are more traditional may also have helped. Certainly, I prefer this to dating 86 women. How much time and heartache? How many stds?
1
I'm afraid from my almost 70 year perspective, this looks a lot like sleeping around. 86 different men and none of these pre-screened men is a suitable partner? You might have better odds in a bar. Well clearly the author doesn't want to settle down, which is fine. I suspect this is partly a reaction to being dumped unceremoniously by her husband- the coward.
On-line dating seems a bit like a huge all-you-can-eat buffet- too many choices and you start to get excessively picky. I met my partner the old-fashioned way; a friend though we would be a good match and introduced us. Voila!
31
It's interesting to speculate on what this article might have been if it was written by someone who doesn't look like Katharine Smyth does. Online dating is a vastly different experience for those who are not among the top 25% most physically attractive members of the species. It's true that this is true of dating in general - but being reduced to a picture or two and some text that by its very nature is going to be trite and facile makes the reliance on physical attractiveness all the more pronounced.
13
Snap judgments based on physical appearance happen all the time in real life too. Yes it would be nice to be introduced by a trusted friend but for many of us that doesn’t happen very often.
6
My husband and met online, and we agree. After going on so many dates that I lost count, I realized that I did not “need” a partner, but would remain open to finding one. After our first date, and my now-husband said that he had met someone else, I did not spook him by falling to pieces, but said that I appreciated his honesty and hoped to remain friends. Then, after he said that he had made a mistake and wanted to date after all, I had gained sufficient perspective to know that life was too short to play by the “rules” and make him suffer. And then, when he proposed marriage, I was sufficiently confident to know that he and I were compatible, and I said “YES!” We have gown together for more than 3 years.
7
@Dana Scherer
Can you refer me to some good dating site where I can find my soulmate too
It is also prime territory for scammers (a.k.a. scam artists). I was scammed for a half-million from my retirement fund. The FBI refers to the crime as "romance scam."
8
Not sure I understood the illustration depicting five larger than life men and a small somewhat dowdy grounded woman.
All the things she desires, love, travel, music, nature and small animals are in the stars.
Then I read the column and realized the illustration perfectly depicted the author's thought.
Sea smoke isn't the only image of bitter air sweeping over warmer waters.
7
A sad fact of life is that physical attractiveness not only counts, but it counts far more than what degrees or hobbies you have, or what your pickup line is, or indeed anything else under your control to change.
12
I met my life mate in a bar by the beach. It's certainly more romantic than making up a false person to impress another person photo-shopping a selfie.
7
On the day my 20 year marriage officially ended after a bitter long divorce I got online with match.com , my very first date was a russian woman whom I had a wonderful 7 year relationship with, we traveled the world, Russian , Ukraine, México , Spain, Greece. After a short 2 year marriage we divorced and on the day the divorce was final I got back on match. Very first date met a gorgeous woman and began a 4 year wonderful relationship which just ended in divorce. Now I’m back online looking for the next chapter. I don’t intend for these relationships to end but they just do. My life has been much richer because of the so called online dating and I’m so lucky to live in these times.
3
My husband of 17 years divorced me. I didn’t want the divorce and still have trouble accepting my current situation. It’s two years post official divorce and four years since he said “romantically, this relationship has run its course.” We have a 12-year old daughter who I NEVER feature in online dating app photos — seems inappropriate to include kid’s photos to me.
I met a man I enjoy, and he enjoys me, but there’s not that indescribable je ne sais quoi developing into something more serious.
We have fantastic sex and agreed should either one of us meet someone who is serious dating material, we’ll tell the other and move on.
I crave the intimacy and emotional connection of a serious relationship, but for now, having fantastic sex — and fun — every week is what it is; however, it’s two years now.
Am still on the apps and meeting people with the hope that love will strike but not enjoying the search like the author.
9
What a depressing piece. Not her experience but her attitude.
I was divorced (with minor kids) in my early 40s, with me as the petitioner (I'm a dude, ex was the opposite gender). Started online dating (my teenish kids were mortified, thought only dorkish losers did the online dating thing). Dated 4 or 5 women in 3 or 4 years, including a long time close friend (major mistake). Needless to say I became disillusioned (86 in 3 years is light years beyond excessive for the author).
Read a lengthy article then about how we think we know the characteristics we want, but focus on the wrong, flighty, meaningless things like hobbies, habits, likes, and politics, among others. Is it really important that your mate love Italian food and walks in the rain?
I kind of gave up on finding a mate and figured on a life of bachelorhood, and settled on a friend to go hiking, have dinner, go to the movies etc. I just happen to click with women more than men so that's where I focused. Met someone, had a platonic friendship (which I think is the real secret) for about 4-5 months. The relationship changed 15 years ago, now very happily married for 10. FYI, she identified in her profile as a conservative GOPer. I, the other end of the spectrum (She now calls herself a "moderate" after Bush 43's 2nd term and the trump disgrace).
The advice in the afore mentioned article? Can you effectively manage a household together, including money. That's it. The other diversity is good.
5
"It can enlarge your world" when you open your mind to more than 666 men (6 pack abs, 6 feet tall, 6 figure income). But that doesn't happen.
5
I couldn’t help but sense a certain egocentricity in the author. There is a Chinese saying that goes “If you want happiness for an hour, take a nap. If you want happiness for a day, go fishing. If you want happiness for a year, inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime, help somebody.” Living outside of oneself is an awesome experience, although I must admit that I have never licked coke off of car keys nor stripped in a Barcelona square; still, I don’t think I’ve missed all that much.
47
I just googled the author. She's tall and pretty, so her experience of Bumble et al. would be matching with every man she swiped on. Also, the pool in New York is deep and wide - not much chance of meeting UN diplomats and movie star ex husbands in Wyoming or Wellington.
17
@Jake Yea, I think that brings the article a bit more back to reality.
1
Anyone who prasies online dating is either fortunate enough to get quality dates (which the majority is not fortunate to get) or just simply out of touch with reality. Up until a few years ago, I placed an ad on OK Cupid with my picture and not a single woman responded to it. I also responded to many women who posted ads there, not a single one responded to me as well. About a year after I stopped using OK Cupid, I read a Los Angeles Times article that New Zealand pop star Lorde was dating a young Asian man. According to the article, she took a lot of flack just for dating him because he's Asian. The article suggested that maybe Asian men are simply "not datable." I am half-Asian and I think most of the white and Hispanic women I responded to are simply not interested in dating Asian guys. Proof that most people who participate in online dating are shallow and go for looks over character. I took my OK Cupid profile down soon after.
3
@Orange County ... well the fact that so many asian women also turn their backs on asian men as well, certainly doesn't help matters for asian men. Sadly, too many people (esp asian women) have bought into all the negative stereotypes about asian men, and which Hollywood and the ad industry perpetuate.
I'll assume that your first dates were initiated and paid for by the men? How many did you actually pay for?
Easy to tout this to women, working guys, not so much.
4
You wanna meet someone, spend a month on Fire Island
Everybody’s always happy and relaxed there.
6
I'd be interested to learning why the husband left and what was learned to make the next real relationship work There's no point in cycling through all these dates if you goal is to get married again. Obviously, you (and everyone else) have job, money ,height, location and other requirements, you might as well be true to yourself, and save a lot of time in the process.
sense i. n going out with random dudes if you haven't understood why the marriage didn't work.
2
I don't mean to be cruel by after 86 dating failures, you're not doing something right.
12
Abstract
Romantic courtship is often described as taking place in a dating market where men and women compete for mates, but the detailed structure and dynamics of dating markets have historically been difficult to quantify for lack of suitable data. In recent years, however, the advent and vigorous growth of the online dating industry has provided a rich new source of information on mate pursuit. We present an empirical analysis of heterosexual dating markets in four large U.S. cities using data from a popular, free online dating service. We show that competition for mates creates a pronounced hierarchy of desirability that correlates strongly with user demographics and is remarkably consistent across cities.
-from the Abstract to "Aspirational Pursuit of Mates in Online Dating Markets," by Bruch and Newman, Science Advances 4(8), DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aap9815
In other words, even if this story is factual, it is extremely unrepresentative.
And we have no way of knowing that it is factual, much as with online dating profiles.
2
Nice written article, but the chance of men finding many women are slim. Women want to play Mrs. Robinson and they look like my grandmother! LOL If you live in an area like I do where the women don't take care of themselves and there are very few available you have reach out and most women want someone in their backyard. I am very discouraged.
1
I did not know that online dating is a bad experience for “most men”! ( It’s iffy for women too. I try see the humor in it...) Does anyone have any ideas of designing a different kind of site that would approach this better for men?
I'm a woman in her twenties who uses OkCupid (and has used Tinder), and I was with the author up until the part about ghosting.
Ghosting, in my book, is only acceptable until you've met in person. You don't owe someone you've never met a continued conversation. But you do need to be mature enough to tell a real person if you don't want to go out again.
That's maturity. Yeah, you can learn from being punched in the face, but it doesn't mean getting punched in the face is good for you. Ghosting isn't good for anybody. It's mean, hurtful, and rude, and a sign that that person is not mature enough to be dating anyone. If you can't own up to the discomfort and potential pain your choices will cause someone else, you should remain offline and single. We've all got enough problems in our lives without people who disappear on us.
(And yes, I hold myself to this rule. It's not easy to tell someone you don't want to see them anymore. But I've done it. And so can everyone else.)
19
If my husband of four years and partner of nine left in the middle of the night with no explanation, I would come to the conclusion that he was a stranger, and that it might be time to revisit 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf'. In reality, a year before we married, we saw a dress rehearsal of the above, and it brought us closer. This memorable event took place decades ago, and long before the advent of online dating.
Having reached an age now, where merry widows can flirt with younger men, I ask them how do they go about their romantic affairs. Ms. Smyth, with certainty and by her own account, has had a rich variety of encounters these last few years, and it took courage to write in praise of online dating. She might enjoy a short story by Jean Thompson, a contemporary in age of this reader, entitled 'Her Untold Story' with a realistic if sinister flavor.
Young lovers, wherever you are, hoping you can find your heart-mate, and it can in fact take place with Cupid's help online, with some patience. An acquaintance found the love of his life after searching for her online. It took two years, and they have been happily wed for over a decade and more.
My last date took place in (?), and if I plan to become a writer in this lifetime, time is not on my side and pages will remain blank and devoid of 'romance'. For this reason, it is helpful to read what up-to-date Venus and Mars have to share in the lonely hearts section.
Keep writing, Ms. Smyth, with joy.
3
Humble brag. Which is not a bad thing but, yes, if you're a woman and you look a certain way, you're going to 'win' at the internet dating thing. You needed to find yourself, get your confidence boosted, enjoy the pursuit by many men. Not a bad thing but, inadvertently or not, it sounded a little like a victory lap. Truth is, you'd probably "win" at the IRL stuff, as well. Hope you find what you're searching for.
10
I think what might be wiser, rather than jumping into dating, is to take time...to explore why previous relationships didn't work well, to pursue new (or old) interests and hobbies that you find interesting and fulfilling, and to get to know yourself physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually, creatively and sexually.
And, to seek the support and guidance of a qualified, professional - well-trained - coach or therapist.
As a professional personal development coach for 20+ years, a person who has taken advantage of both therapy and coaching, married for 25 years and single for 15 years...
I can attest to the fact that though it may be the road less taken...you can learn far more from focusing on being single, than pursuing dating. (Plus, I cannot tell you how many clients I have encountered who are addicted to online dating!)
And then when you do choose to pursue relationship again...there's far more joy and fun and play, than drama and angst and disappointment.
Indeed, no one "completes us." But few of us truly choose to pursue a path of completing ourselves. Imagine how fabulous a relationship can be when both parties are complete within themselves?
20
@Kelly Grace Smith P.S. I just read a whole lot of the posts for this article...and discovered I am not alone in feeling this online dating thing is just not normal, healthy...or fun!
Thank you all!
3
What an amazing story.
I kept thinking to myself that the author must not have children, to go on so many dates.
9
Wow! Interesting essay. This sounds a lot like my life as an older millennial. After working overseas in my 20s and ending an "IRL" long term relationship with a German man, I returned home. Now 30 and single, I was happy teaching and being back in graduate school. While my friends got married and had children, I was always the independent, single lady at the get togethers, but I didn't mind. A few years ago at age 35, I was ready to begin dating again and opted for Meetup groups and online dating with Hinge and Match. I met some very nice men, as well as some duds, in both contexts. Dating in general can be exhausting. I'm grateful that I met someone whom I hope to marry one day. As I think about the future, I wonder how dating will continue to evolve, but I'm glad to no longer be there.
5
The funny thing about online dating is if you meet someone you really like, it usually is unrequited and you are devastated by a ghost experience. It is equally crushing when they just say, you are not my type, no chemistry. After one date. But usually not many people are going to give it more than one date.
Also, there is always the fear the other person is back online looking for someone else, while you think they might actually like you (they don’t).
13
@Scientist Exactly, especially in the city in which we both reside. I'm sure it happens everywhere though.
Those thoughts remind me of my friends struggle with online dating at first. He hadn’t yet formed a strong enough sense of self, therefore placed more importance on what his date thought of him. What matters is what you think of your date.
4
I wonder if there's a process that can expand one's world to include people you aren't interested in dating. I'm not trying to be snarky; when I was single, dating was mostly what I chose to make time for. But for me, a lifetime of connecting to the world outside of work mostly through my relationships with women and the paucity - indeed the absence - of friendships with men is something I've come to regret.
2
Even though I have never been interested in online dating, this story and surely the way it is told makes me curious about it. It can be frustrating if one just looks for love, but really exciting if the idea is to expand human connection and learning.
2
I absolutely loved the way this was written. I mainly admire the perspective Katharine approached. She mentioned how she didn’t believe that you would definitely find true love on there. She has just lived for the experiences she has had with all of the 86 men she has went out with. As humans, we naturally want to learn, and getting to know people from vastly different backgrounds is a great way to do so. Of course there are always the precautions you need to take to make sure you are safe such as meeting in a public area. Other than that, getting to know certain life skills and hearing interesting stories can be achieved from online dating. That is nothing that our past decades have been able to create.
5
This is an interesting story. Maybe we should all engage in living, communicating, there is so many for free to go in the city to meet people . This is the political season there town hall meetings, a chance to interact and make new friends. First you have to interact to see if your going to click and maybe they have friends. To waste time on an app might take away the fun of meeting someone at the museum, bookstore.
Living is an adventure dont miss out no matter the age. Your days become full not with busy work but real opportunities . The population is getting older and there are plenty of men who dont want a barbie doll but a real relationship. Remember life doesn't have do overs when its over its over.
Try walking with your friends before living on an app for opportunities.
2
The thing about sites like Tinder, OKCupid etc that's disingenuous, likely the cause of such a high rate of dating failure, is reality.
The bite might be caused by their clients who persist in the age old art of disception and/or unreal expectations, many hire people to write their profiles and messages.
These men, it's mostly men, want to sell women the moon, they cannot understand why rocks just don't cut it.
2
I believer you're confusing online dating with dislocution. I'll borrow from Christine Boyanoski because I can't think of a better way to say it.
"'Dislocution’ is a term, coined by James Joyce and adopted by cultural critic and curator Sarat Maharaj, that describes the double disruption of place and speech that is a condition of the displaced, or those in exile. These groups, including exiles, refugees, immigrants and expatriates, must find alternatives to their native forms of expression which no longer serve them in new and different cultures."
Essentially, the author was displaced by the sudden disappearance of her husband while simultaneously making the transition into early middle age. A time of narrowing possibilities. You're essentially encountering two new cultures at once. Becoming middle aged and being single as middle aged person. Not surprisingly people seek ways to adapt now their old processes and habits no longer serve them. This is the language you're leaning in your dislocation.
Katharine Smyth appears to have turned online dating into a resource used for one vast anthropological experiment. I can't blame her. I've done the same thing. Although never with an online dating apt and almost always platonically. Sometimes you find someone interesting and you decide to go the same way for awhile. Similar to what Chuck Palahniuk called a single-serving friend. When your paths part, so long. Nice knowing you.
4
The founding premise of much in the NYT, like this piece, is negativity about men or positivity about everyone but men. It sells. If that's what it takes to keep the old lady gliding along, it's better than seeing her fade away, but I find it upsetting. As if many men haven't had the same experiences online dating. We're not likely to hear about that here.
8
@Terry Reading the essay by Ms. Smyth it did not appear, to my mind, that she was speaking negatively about men at all. Rather, she seems quite fond of men and describes them, for the most part, with a certain lightness of heart. As for a man’s perspective on dating, if you want to write your story in the NY Times, I would be happy to read it.
5
Beautifully written essay.
Imagine my dismay when, newly separated from my now ex-husband, Match decided that he and I were perfect for each other. I never did join Match.
31
I do agree with the author in that online dating can help you meet people that you would never cross paths with IRL. It can be a great introductory tool, and I have met many interesting people. However, I have found that online dating is akin to being a kid in a candy store. Most want instant gratification and don't want to take the time to build trust that leads to authentic relationships. If it doesn't happen after a date or two? Oh well, there are more to be found online. For this reason it is demoralizing and just doesn't seem worth it anymore.
12
this is very well said. but the question remains: how can a person wanting a lasting relationship find someone?
2
@caroline
I think what a lot of other people here have been suggesting rings true. Joining Meet Up groups, volunteering, being aware of those who cross your paths and being open and willing to see if a connection exists. It is tough though, and a lot easier said than done. I think a lot of assumptions have to be made when trying to meet people this way. (i.e. are they single too? are they interested?) Plus, someone's gotta break the ice with a stranger in public, and for those who are more introverted, it can be difficult. Guess it just boils down to putting yourself out there, and being open to what is.
I lived a heterosexual life for half a century and begin online dating of men after my divorce 10 years ago. 4 1/2 years ago, I came out as a lesbian and begin online dating with women, and I met both of my girlfriends since then on Match. A couple of notes, having been on both sides:
- Most men don’t read the profiles - they respond visually. This is a generalization of course, but I found that most men couldn’t be bothered reading my profile and would send me generic emails that said something like “nice smile,” accompanied by reluctance to engage in any real discourse through messaging. Women, on the other hand, read every word and actually comment on what I write, leading to meaningful electronic conversation.
- Online dating differs from “real life” in one very significant way: when you meet someone online, you’re going into it with the hope that there will be a romantic relationship, and you look for traits that support that desire (possibly ignoring red flags). When you meet someone in real life, you get to know them for who they are and because of your common interests, and then if there is more than friendship, it develops naturally due to your compatible energies. Online dating has it all backwards.
I am recently single again and have turned to Meetup groups as a means of meeting prospective partners. It offers the best of both worlds: it brings people together due to a common interest. Maybe you’ll hit it off with someone, but if not, you’ve made new friends.
23
A Gorgeous Story. This is your liberation- your very own Eat, Pray, Love 2019. Live well and hold your head up high like the Sunflower to the blue yonder...I have lived in reverse- all experience and love making and travel and rock n roll and a life if heroic highs and gut punching lows. I cannot wait to find a husband and settle down to a life of repeated sameness and stability. Each bookend creates w WHOLE.
7
This was a delightful read! I wish I had such a positive experience.
I went on my first online date back in 2002 shortly after i finished grad school. Going on dozens of “dates” was fantastic training ground for a 26 year old virgin who had been too shy to date in school.
But as dozens of dates turned into hundreds of dates over the next 13 years, only one ever turned into a relationship...a bad relationship...a short relationship of 8 months that ended with him telling me I was “boring” and dumping me to move-in with a girl he met over the weekend.
I did not have this confidence, independence building experience while gallivanting around the world having wild adventures with exotic, fascinating men. I met a lot of average NYC men who repeatedly indicated to me in one way or another that I was fine for now while they looked for something better.
Relationships and later marriage came from meeting men “IRL”. It was much harder to fill up my social calendar this way but when these men did come along, they valued me far more than someone who believed he could order up ten more me’s with a few swipes.
38
For the love of my life.
Jealousy of my friends who met their mate online and lived happily ever after. Soon after getting separated and then divorced I jumped on the marry go round.
At first I listed all my athletic accomplishments, my current fitness, the property I owned, the business and employees I run. It worked, I met some wonderful women, and learned about myself. But the dating came and went and was no 86 dates.
Over a year into the adventure I changed my profile to state I was nothing more than a man child trying to ignore life's realities. I was the one your mother warned you about. Women are so fickle.
Then one day, a girl I have known for years, she and I started spending more time together. I couldn't be happier.
6
Good luck when you are 60 instead of 35 - the adventures aren’t there. Instead it’s -“I’m not looking for anything serious” like we’re all trying to entrap a man instead of just trying to make a connection and find someone to love in our old age.
42
Last summer I went on a no-holds barred online dating marathon. In three months, I went on 30 dates with both men and women. I am now in relationship that has lasted for a year, with a lovely, genuine, generous, and spirited woman. It is not a perfect situation: she is coparenting with her wife, and they live together as non-romantic partners. But she is far and away the best person I have ever been with, and the joy of finding an authentic love outweighs all of the inconveniences of our unconventional situation. More to the point, without Tinder, I would never have met her, thereby missing an experience that’s has unquestionably changed my life for the better. What I learned from online dating is to keep an open mind: you never know who might meet. For sake of context: I am a 46 y old white professional woman, never married, no kids, and I am attractive but “kinda average for LA.” I know it is easier for women to get dates than it is for men, but it is still NOT THAT EASY. As a person with post-graduate degrees my biggest challenge was not my curvy figure or my age: it was finding someone who could tolerate dating a nerdy college professor, without freaking out about a differential in education level. Yet I persisted. Keeping an open-mind is essential: love comes in many different forms.
32
@Depressed in CA Right on.
4
@LJIS Thanks!
"Our lives had lost their capacity to surprise."
Marriage is not supposed to surprise. It's a venerable institution -- "Love" optional -- for jointly managing life's surprises, not a theater for staging them. Even children are best planned. If you're asking marriage to keep life a fresh, entertaining adventure, you're really asking for a divorce from the get-go. Just a matter of when and who makes the first move.
21
after my marriage crumbled i signed up with a couple of dating apps and did some looking. seems like most of the women gush about the beach being a favorite place. i like the beach, and this is not my line, but every time i go someone from greenpeace tries to push me back into the water. that line in my profile might be one of the reasons i never connected with anyone. except for the woman i met at a local diner for coffee. she immediately went into a recitation of "i'm vegan, gluten-free, blah blah blah." i promptly ordered a piece of blueberry pie. and anyway i prefer gazing at the night sky to get a sense of wonder.
i signed off the dating apps. whatever happens, happens. i am not going to put much effort into looking, mainly because i just don't care.
9
At 50, after being divorced for 4 years, I met my wife on Match. She is amazing and I can truly say she is my soul mate. I can't say that I disagree with any of the comments below or disagree with the wonderful essay that led to these conversations. But I can say, without a doubt, that the leap was so worth it.
Good luck to all - as we all deserve love in our lives.
31
Excellent piece - I've been on and off of online sites for many years and can attest to a similar sense of discovery both of other words and of self. Gracias!
9
Who doesn't crave adventure? Who isn't driven to meet many interesting people? Who refuses opportunity to push past our usual spheres of comfort? But to do so not as a directed, independent, reasonably discriminating adult, but as an appendage to strangers... reflects an exorbitant psychic cost of admission for Ms. Smyth's 86 "adventures".
6
I met my second husband online, Match.com, after my first died from cancer at the impossibly young age of 45. I was rearing three children, two in their teens. I was 47. The man was in his mid-fifties, divorced and balding. I had been on one other date in the several years after my first husband's death. It was his last day on match.com, and we began writing long emails back and forth. We met after three weeks, and it was "love at first sight." He is a teacher, a writer, and an amazing person. Maybe I was lucky. Maybe I was not so concerned about looks. I do know one thing: we have made an amazing life together, I would not have found him but for on-line dating. Count me grateful and happy!
56
@Vanessa Hall
Mazel tov, what a great anecdote!
7
I'm not sure how online dating, which I have done, can be any more deeply depressing than trying to meet someone in a pick up bar.
I know the reason I did not do well with on line dating: A lack of Italian women on dating cites.
2
@Paul
What an odd conclusion.
Lack of Italian women aka too many ethnics? Have you considered going to Italy or is that too far from your house in Gilbert/Chandler?
Beautifully written and sad.
I've had adventures. The best one is 49 years of marriage and 3 grandchildren.
Ms. Smyth's life seems so desperate.
20
I was widowed after 21 happy years of marriage. Though I did have several long term relationships as a result of online dating, I decided instead to focus on my career and my friends. Perhaps it is different when you are in your 50s. Many of the men I dated had lied about their age and were older. I am thin, take care of myself, and work out. Online, these men said they did the same but it was obvious they did not. It seemed that most men my age wanted women far younger. I was ghosted once before I was familiar with the term but in the end, I realized online dating was a waste of time, better spent doing things that made me happy. I have never looked back.
30
@j " It seemed that most men my age wanted women far younger. .."
Keep in mind that the online world is not the real world, and many people look for or 'demand' things in a mate, that they'd not be so demanding of in the real world. So take the age thing...many men online are simply throwing out a line to see what sticks. They may 'say' they want a younger woman (to see who responds) when in fact in the real world, they may have found you plenty attractive.
Really, only lame guys are so fixated on the age of the woman ('she must be X number of years younger'). I'm not sure of your race, but as a white woman I've noticed that white and asian men seem to be the most rigid...that their woman must fit certain 'criteria'....thin, of a certain race, of a certain age range, etc. I jokingly say 'thank god for latin and black men' who overall seem more capable of appreciating women for simply Being women. They are more appreciative of the essence of woman, in all its possible and beautiful forms, and seem less fixated on the 'age' of the woman. So long as they think a woman beautiful and attractive, the age on her driver's license generally matters not. That's the kind of guy I'm looking for.
I also notice that men of the older generations buy into the older man/younger woman notion, more than the younger generations of men do. Have you considered younger men? They may be more appreciative of you. ;-)
3
She spins and everything becomes a fairytale come true - an eternal optimist that sees all through rose colored glasses - I will say i’d Rather spend time with her than most others though i’m More into deep relationships than superficial. What a wonderful writer.
1
This is precisely what online dating curates, a perspective that fixates increasingly inwardly. The number of "I's" used in this piece is shocking. Each encounter is rendered into something utilitarian- what she got from James, Bruce, and whoever else as it relates to who she is. And now she is who she is. It's just taken 86 men for her to get to this point (I will not dwell in how regressive this sounds).
When the author writes about Praise of Online Dating, what comes out is really Praise of Herself. Which, in the context of durable, committed, covenental relationships, somewhat misses the point of it all.
66
I saw it more as a situation where life was throwing her lemons (men), and she chose to make lemonade out of the experiences. You can only control what you can control, in this case, she chose to use the experiences in their best light to improve herself.
1
I looked Smyth's photo online, and she's quite attractive, so I don't think that's her issue. What's missing in the essay is how many she herself ghosted and whether any of these meetups lasted longer than a date or two.
For a NYC resident to think a relationship with someone in RI would work out shows considerable optimism. In the future looking for men closer to home would likely be more fruitful.
7
What's comical is she never talks about who she is at her core. It's all about the extant experience.
Rilke said it clearly in Letters to a Young Poet:
"Two people who fling themselves at each other without knowing themselves can expect to become even more confused"
56
Many [most?] folks who have a long term commitment to online dating are doing it for the self affirmation they receive from the attention their profiles generate.
It is a little like Insta for the technically challenged.
Not that there is anything wrong with that ethos - I just would have expected an author to be a tad more self-reflective.
4
Long story short, my first and last attempt at dating online turned me into a self-harming superfreak. I was angry with myself for working hard to be liked by someone I didn’t like. I needed therapy for some other issues and that experience sent me there. My therapist regularly tells me to let go of needing to be loved.
Online dating is not a transformative life experience. We say that to placate ourselves after rejection challenges our positive self-definitions. It’s been a struggle to look at myself but I think many of us aren’t realistic about how we are perceived by the people we interact with. We should also accept that lots of jerks in the world date online because in real life people don’t like them.
Two years ago, my ‘jerk’ was sharing photos of his mail-order Eastern European bride. He was lonely and no-one else wanted him. He and his bride didn’t speak a language in common. I knew that he chose her because she couldn’t repudiate his verbal abuse.
12
Or maybe it's simply a mystery as to when and how you'll meet the right person for a committed relationship.
Maybe it will be tomorrow or ten years from now. Who knows.
I lived out west and happened to be visiting San Diego and my future wife lived back here & also happened to be visiting at the same time. We had mutual friends, and that's how we met.
I think the main thing is follow your instincts and intuition.
If you sense you should use a dating app, fine. If not, don't.
You'll know something feels right when it does.
And Good luck, all relationships are ultimately a leap of faith.
But when it feels right, go for it.
9
When I was widowed in middle age I went on a few online dates. I'm a gregarious person and never had trouble meeting people but I was living in a small and isolated place. What I learned was how seductive the initial contact can be.....someone likes me! Soon I'd be checking my profile compulsively and savoring every word. This was almost always followed by disappointment, stultifying lack of chemistry or the unveiling of outright lies. I think both men and women need to be aware that disembodied words are just that, and that some career online daters deliver standards lines, because they work. It's a minefield to be entered with low expectations, and some people who keep at it are rewarded for that.
19
Katharine! - You wrote the piece that I have been writing in my head for the past three years and one that my friends have been begging me to write. Of course you wrote it far more beautifully. I have had so much fun with online dating and in three years have had two serious relationships and about 30 dates in all (I am 52 and a bit shy in person but can connect easily online) Each date feels like reading a wonderful novel. It is so interesting to hear people's stories and about their search for love. Of all these dates, only one was terrible. He showed up 40 minutes late, in his pajamas, with no money! However, I still left with a smile on my face. It definitely is in the attitude.
10
I dated online before it was cool. I met several women whom I dated briefly. Then I met a wonderful woman, online, whom I married about a year later. Now, eighteen years and two wonderful kids later, I can't say anything bad about online dating, even when I have no idea how it has evolved since then.
9
I find that only about 1 out of every 10 men write more than a paragraph about themselves, as if that were enough for a woman to go on, and a lot of them write a single line or absolutely nothing. Those fellows will probably not put a lot of effort into a relationship. I also find that the most inappropriate men take fliers when it is perfectly clear that I am not for them (non-punctuators, usually, even though I identify myself as an editor in my profile). Could be they don't read the profiles, which does not inspire confidence. I don't need to broaden my horizons with someone who is functionally illiterate. We all have a lot of gripes about online dating. The best thing to do, I think, is to not engage with someone who is unlikely to appreciate who you are. That way you don't get ghosted. I'm also not very successful at online dating, but that's OK. Someone may come along for whom I am exactly perfect. Best substitute for a good man is a good dog, and a good dog is much better than a bad man.
64
@Barb Crook
Terrific perspective that I imagine serves you well. I particularly appreciated "I don't need to broaden my horizons with someone who is functionally illiterate." Indeed!
7
@Barb Crook I think you are being too picky. You are weeding out men for not writing a paragraph or typos? I mean, when you finally meet a guy in person, will those things really matter? I don't think typing "there" instead of "their" means a guy doesn't appreciate you, it's likely a typo or bad autocorrect.
I feel that whatever I write on a profile is simultaneously never good enough and yet not quite me. It doesn't seem to matter what I write, I still get little to no response. Writing a paragraph on Tinder or Bumble seems more like a liability than an advert.
On the flip side, when I read women's profiles they all say the same things and none of it is particularly valuable in deciding whether to match and what to talk about. There is a lot of "I love the outdoors, but I also like to stay in" which cancels itself out and likely means I went for a relaxed hike once this year. One problem with online dating is that everyone is trying to sound "sexy" and "adventurous" and it just comes off as generic. If women want to seem sexy and meet good guys who actually read their profiles, then women should tone down the sexy appeal for something more grounded and authentic.
I kind of wonder what your paragraph sounds like.
"Someone may come along for whom I am exactly perfect. Best substitute for a good man is a good dog..." Geez, just look for an average guy who you kind of like.
"I'm also not very successful at online dating" To be a bit mean... Gee I wonder why!
2
@Barb Crook Yes! When on a dating app read the entire profile of each person for heaven’s sake! If they are worth your attention they probably put a lot of thought into what they wrote. When contacting someone ask about them as a person and reference things they wrote about in their profile. “U look hot” just won’t cut it with most women. Lay off the overtly sexual stuff. If you are able to find the right connection all of the other stuff will work itself out.
The author perfectly summarizes her experience and while she did not end up falling in love and being in a committed relationship, she gained something else. Perspective. You see, the unintended consequence of experiences is renewed perspective. She may have wanted one thing but ended up with something else and that's still growth. Thanks for sharing!
8
After reading this, I’m disappointed that there’s not a single admission of own potential short comings that have led to her repeated ghostings and frustrations in relationships. It comes off as one big self congratulate rationalization for NOT addressing whatever core issues that is holding her back from finding true happiness - which she clearly hasn’t yet after 86 rejections
10
I'm glad the author has found a way of looking at this in a positive light. However, I must say that to me it sounds rather depressing on the whole that someone can go out with 84 different people and find zero who are what you're looking for. I don't think it's a rare phenomenon either. From what I've heard, it seems to be the general rule that you won't meet very many true matches.
Maybe there's something wrong with the way online dating works. Maybe true attraction takes time and effort that you can't simulate with swipes, messages, and a few pre-planned and generally stereotypical dates.
14
While I found this article amusing, I have to say that another retrospective on online dating written by a wealthy, blonde, attractive white women does not contribute much value. I, like many other readers, cannot relate to her experiences in the slightest, and they come across more as self-aggrandizing than of legitimate reflection.
More interesting than highlighting the number of different men and the experiences they offered would be a serious reflection on the type of man she matched with. To write so dismissively of a spontaneous trip to Jamaica for a third date is telling of the type of person Katharine is, and the type of person she matched with. How many suitors were white? How many were well educated, Cis, heterosexual? And how many were not? What does that tell us about the author's values, sense of self, of worthiness, of beauty? That would be a compelling article.
Furthermore, there is no acknowledgment of the author's privilege here. Katharine had these experiences because of the white body she inhabits and the society she lives in which elevates that body to the pinnacle of value. Many readers accurately pointed out that men can never have the experience that the author so heartily suggests the reader to have. Nor can many women, especially women of color and women on the margins.
This article at best comes across as another white woman showcasing her privilege, and at worst is insulting to those who will never be able to relate.
301
@Michael when she mentioned her "family's summer home" I couldn't help but roll my eyes - where I grew up I never heard of such a thing as a vacation home, let alone someone who owned one.
61
@Michael-Agree. If I were her friend, I would also advise her that sleeping with a man after a first date or an alcohol-fueled encounter is not only bad manners but unwise and possibly unsafe. Back in the 90s when one-night stands became conflated with women's emancipation, I schooled my friends that it almost never works: if you set yourself up to have an intimate encounter with someone you hardly know, you also set yourself up to be ghosted (disrespected). Sex also skews perception and makes it harder to know, "is this person really good for me?" People need to act the behavior they want to receive and--at minimum--model the good manners and respect you'd expect from a friend.
44
“For weeks I had been holed up in my family’s empty summerhouse” kind of says it all about her 35 year old privilege.
How about “For years I’ve lived alone with my cats, going to a soul crushing job wondering why I wasn’t worthy of love”?
47
Caving to a friend's plea that she not do it alone I signed up for an online dating site last month and got my first date about two weeks later: suffice it to say a lobotomy would've been more exciting but I'm forever glad I made myself endure those late night hours of painful awkwardness, the clumsy good night kiss. I got to experience another human being I almost certainly wouldn't have met, however opposite we may have been. It taught me humility in trying to tolerate someone I otherwise would've chosen to ignore. The endless quest to be loved is taken up by all, after all.
5
I met my now husband in an MMORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) in January of 1999. I met several people in that game. I continue to be friends with 2 who are not my husband. We'd all log on together and do something or just talk, which at that time meant a lot typing. Then my husband and I met and we discovered how much more we had in common than the game. We decided to marry but it was nearly another year before we did that. We just lived together and... Now, 18-years later, we live in France.
Regardless of what anyone thinks about online games, and yes I still play two now, I don't think they will cause anyone to become a mass murderer. What they do though is over a long or short time, allow ever widening glimpses of that person's actually personality, values, integrity, ethics, and all the bad things as well.
But I have to say this: I would never trust any dating site even though I know couples who met, then married, then began families and they are happy about it. So what do I know really. I know I thought I would never date or marry again and was settled with it. Which it why I bought a computer so I could play an MMORPG called Asheron's Call. I had lived without a man in my life for 21 years, raised my children, and was left with empty time. A $9.99 monthly subscription fee looked pretty good after a couple of years of quiet evenings.
2
@Susannah Allanic
Yes but how does one avoid an incel on one of those games?
I agree that it is a bottomless pit for men. Most women are overwhelmed with responses and don't bother to write back unless you look like Brad Pitt. Or the men that write them dont interest them because they wrote them! Many people lie about who they are; lie about their age and their pictures are old. Men are mostly guilty of this. All the ads sound the same as if there is some kind of template one must have to get it approved. Nothing is worse than spending money and time and still getting rejected!! And some sites have phony people who don't even exist to lure you in. Nothing can substitute for doing the things you like and meeting people "naturally." Its way too artificial and most people are unrealistic about who they can meet.
8
I keep thinking 'smorgasbord' reading this. 86 dates? I gotta say Wow. It's like a tasting menu of the human race, some of which is bound to be unsavory. I'm not being critical of Internet dating because there's a positive side to meeting new people and the competition for a companion in the 21st century is quite fierce - unless of course you are famous or gorgeous or rich. (None of which I am) It occurs to me that someone like Ms. Smyth is outgoing and adventurous which makes me wonder why would she choose the Internet and the thicket of brambles it represents when she appears to have the skill set necessary to attract a non TCP/IP compatible companion.
11
@Tom - "...a non TCP/IP compatible companion."
lol, I'm gay and just waking up and I thought someone added more letters to my community without checking with me first. Been happening for decades, now.
1
Great read! Married 30 years but now I think I would like to try online dating.
3
Last Sunday I went to brunch with a liberal atheist I met on Match; even better, she has a masters degree in the same discipline I do. And she’s cute. Tonight we’re meeting for dinner at a fun wine bar. I’m not super hot, but I’m persistent, have thick skin, and as you can tell my personality is awesome. It can be done, fellas, - try not to be creepy, boring, rude, overly deferential, or a slob.
135
Yeah but is all that time you are spending on online worth it? Perhaps try doing what I do. Ask out women irl
2
Wow! To read many of the comments, you would be led to believe that online dating is a terrible idea. Don't tell that to my son (or his wife of 14 years). They both lived in remote New Hampshire villages where, as my son said, the pickings were rather thin. They signed up for match.com, met, and, four years later, flew to Hawaii where they were married on the beach. They have a great relationship. Granted, they both made it past the eighth grade which may be a factor here. She is a medical doctor and he is a biomedical engineer. But, like all successful marriages, it doesn't come easy and they have to work on it every day. But they respect each other and treat each other with love and dignity
13
@Michael in Vermont
Have fun and best of luck!
1
I found this article depressing; sounds like she has too many unresolved issues from her disappearing partner to actually get emotionally invested in anyone else. The disappearing partner would make a more interesting essay.
40
Please use protection.
24
Thanks, Dad.
2
Try GRINDR for a real treat
7
All of these dating sites ask the same question:
“What Am I Looking For?”
...and every single profile says the same thing...
I finally changed my answer to read:
What am I looking for? I’m looking for my DAMN KEYS! I can’t find my keys! I can’t even find my car! In fact, THIS ISN'T EVEN MY PLANET
In 24 hours I had fifty responses. (Not all positive, I might add.)
But if you can make someone laugh, you can make someone love you. And if you can make someone love you, getting the last 4 digits of their Social is REALLY easy. LOL
(Oh yeah...I’ll give anyone my first born if they can obliterate THAT stupid acronym from the online world)
LOL LOL LOL
24
Funny. 1409.
1
This is a lovely essay but it sounds completely made up.
55
I feel as if I wrote this myself. Wonderfully worded and exactly my experience dating for 3 years after my 30 year marriage ended. I never intended for my online dating life to turn into anything other than new experiences and new connections to different types of people. I will stay connected with a few of those '86' men as friends for life but I did actually find an amazing man after trying out what was a new site for me for only a few days. We met just before I turned 60 almost 3 years ago. I learned so much about myself and would not have been able connect with the person I'm meant to be with had I not experienced what I allowed myself to experience over those 3 years. I never would have gone a VW campervan adventure through the area of Florida I grew up in with a man I'll remain close to as many years as possible had I not had the online dating experiences I had. I am who I am now because I opened myself up to a completely different world than I'd been in while married. And now our adventures together continue. Life could not be better.
10
I met my wife 'online' in 2000....before the internet really 'took off'....so my experience is a little dated, but very real.
She lived 4600 miles away....in Russia.
We've been married for 18 years....and have three stunning boys and a few other things to show for it.
Put that in your internet romance pipe and smoke it.
36
You lost me at “men who have slept with their sisters.” Online dating requires a bit more judgment than communicated by this article, entertaining as it is.
20
It's WAY less 'demoralizing' when you're a woman and have 400 messages every time you open an app, as compared to many men who swipe right 21,000 times only to match with eight bots and one woman who is currently in a relationship.
10
Yes as a woman you only need to figure out which of those messages are from serial killers, abusers, chronically self pitying men, commitment-phobes, morally empty, cheaters, etc. who take advantage of their privilege to harass, stalk, hurt, and kill you. By the way, at least 3/4 the messages are from men who wish you had the personality of a blow up sex doll. Welcome to being objectified.
1
ahhh...the travails of intellectuals confronted by biology and thinly regulated human behavior...
5
@Ami
Ahahaha! Lovely. Bingo!
1
I enjoyed this article. I know several people who have met the love of their life on dating apps. However, if you have certain immutable characteristics (ethnicities/races that are considered to be "less desirable" by the majority, a disability, etc.), these apps can turn into a "dating on hard mode" situation. The best attitude is to not take it personally and use dating apps as a supplement to the old fashioned way - going outside.
8
Was anyone else bothered by the incongruity of the author feeling the horror of being "ghosted" immediately followed by "I should acknowledge, too, that I have also behaved badly at times, failing to write someone back once real life takes hold".
18
Ghosting is ceasing all contact with someone you’ve met or even been dating. The author was referring to not replying to a message on the dating site or perhaps a text message after numbers were exchanged.
1
This piece conveniently ignores the fact that online dating can be a horrific experience for most men. Most men rarely get any matches, and even if they match, they're often met with silence on the other end. Unless you possess the immense privilege of being in the top 20% of most attractive men, online dating can and is an demoralizing, self-worth reducing, graveyard of hopelessness.
412
@Xenon
I second this sentiment, and think it's something that most are missing here (or have been spared from). Online dating, especially for men who generally initiate a contact, can be "the place where messages from kind souls go to be unanswered, and fall into a bottomless pit". It may seem, on paper, to be a way to broaden options, but all too often many have found it to be soul-crushing and hurtful, only making things worse, sending the message that "your profile doesn’t interest me enough to respond to your message (and I’m getting messages from lots of other men)“. It's not intentional but rather just the reality of the logistics of the platform, and something to consider in this discussion…
48
@Xenon
If you're a man who isn't in that top-whatever percent, the only way to approach online dating is to not take it too seriously. If you're fastidiously looking at every profile for compatibility, you're bound to be disappointed.
Swipe right on everyone and let the matches roll in. Ignore the ones you're not attracted to, reach out to the ones you are (and even the expect a small percentage to respond). It's a pure numbers game, so focus less on finding the right profile and more on meeting up as soon as possible.
Sure, you're going to meet up with A LOT of women that aren't right for you, but from a pure percentage standpoint, you're likely to meet a few who are.
78
@Xenon Yep
7
This was really well written, I throughly enjoyed reading. Thank you!
2
What is ghosting? Perhsps you could explain the lingo a bit.
@Whitard It means suddenly the counterparty unexpectedly goes silent and stays silent (they rudely end contact with you).
4
@Diane Thank you for the clarification!
I think that the benefits named by the author are non-existent for 60 yrs+ daters. Their goal is to find someone who looks like he still has a pulse!
10
Hmmm.... this could very well end the way of “Looking for Mr. Goodbar”; well, the internet version.
Youngsters, please look that up.
2
Not everything ends in a gruesome homicide.
1
While this article recommends online dating services for the ability to meet a wide range of people, I question the author's attempt to make this seem normal behavior. Perhaps it worked for her because of the "place" she was "in" but to write an article to advocate for this kind of behavior is not helpful.
On the surface this author seems self-aware and has a sensitivity that would seem to be at odds with her need to reveal herself to herself through her quest for a companion... 86 of them. Licking cocaine off something or other is certainly not behavior to emulate nor some of the other stuff she did.
Those wanting a relationship would be better off by volunteering in some area of interest that might yield a greater chance of a compatible relationship.
Please be smart enough to not allow a writer's fantasy to normalize activity that, from here, looks pretty immature if not self destructive. Be careful, everyone.
12
@Blanche White This all sounds extremely normal for those of us who weren't born in the Cretaceous Period. Be careful-- if you clutch those pearls any tighter, you'll crack them.
Going out with 86 men over 3 years is not my idea of how to expand your horizons or experience multiple world views. I'd rather develop my own personal interests, take classes or join groups that offer opportunities to meet others with similar interests, and perhaps make new connections through these outlets. There's a difference between the world of online dating, swiping through endless profiles, and engaging in sexting or ghosting vs. bring present in the actual physical world around you and embracing the risks and encounters it offers...
481
@J. Grant
I hear you. I find the premise of online dating to be superficial and otherwise unappealing. And the bottom line is that if the forum does not speak to you, the right person is not going to be found there. It's pretty significant whether two people are inclined, or not, to use it.
Thanks for what you wrote and I wish you good times to come, however you find them.
24
@J. Grant
I agree. Maybe it's because I'm an introvert, but I don't think I'd find most of these men half as interesting as the author does.
43
@J. Grant
Very well said and absolutely true. Thank you.
These kind of articles end up normalizing behavior that is not healthy.
37
What a beautifully written essay! I went into this article skeptical, as online dating leaves me feeling demoralized, and left with a sense of optimism of looking at it instead as the stories and experiences one collects in this awkward, fumbling adventure.
Online dating does give one an opportunity to meet people outside of their social circles, this is true.
I do, however, find that ghosting is the norm, rather than the exception. I scratch my head often at conversations that are initiated and then fall away after two or three texts, pouring over the content and wondering what was going on on the other side.
I'm certainly not innocent in ghosting -- but I'm far more mindful of it now than when I started dating online. It's bad etiquette, and truly a mark of our always-connected-but-never-connecting culture.
Here's hoping online dating matures. Here's hoping we continue to use it as a way to get out of our comfort zones. Here's hoping we can remember this is another human being on the other end of the swipe.
202
@AMH One wouldn't talk all night to someone at a cocktail party, so why take it so personally when texting conversations stop? Texting is low risk, it's the small talk you'd make at a bar or speed dating event. Don't invest emotionally until you're in an actual relationship.
9
@AMH: Conventional dating never matured; why would you expect online dating to mature?
If conventional dating had matured, there would be no need for online dating.
Maybe it's the people, not the venue.
6
@Michelle But 'ghosting' is not the equivalent of talking all night... it's more like turning your back on someone mid-conversation and walking away without a word of explanation.
One can end a conversation gracefully, with a few honest words ('Hey, this isn't working out for me, thanks for the insights and laughs, I've enjoyed our exchange but let's close it out now.')
8
This is not the first online dating retrospective I've read. It probably won't be the last. But, like all of the ones I've read, this one is written by a woman, because no one wants to hear men's experiences with online dating.
In three years, the author has dated 86 different people. That works out to about 2.5 different guys every single month, for three years. The average man will meet maybe 2.5 women a year.
I’m single, I have 3 college degrees, a great job, a nice apartment of my own, and a car. I’m in excellent shape, I’m working on personal growth, and I have great friend and hobbies. I kept stats the last time I used Tinder. Out of 933 swipes, I got 7 matches, one of which turned into a disappointing date.
Online dating is hard for everyone. Every woman I’ve talked to about it has related experiences of unwanted penis pictures, sexual advances, and general grossness. They’re also related difficulties with “too many options,” leading them to do what the author does: reject them all, because why bother with someone less than perfect when you can just swipe up someone new?
Online dating leads people to never commit and never fully appreciate their options. It causes us to become exhausted when dealing with too many options, and depressed when dealing with too few. It makes us feel inferior, as we swipe through hundreds of pictures of attractive people who aren’t interested in us. It makes us feel gross as we sift through dozens of crude, unimaginative messages.
675
@Randall I completely disagree with your conclusion:
"Online dating leads people to never commit and never fully appreciate their options. It causes us to become exhausted when dealing with too many options, and depressed when dealing with too few. It makes us feel inferior, as we swipe through hundreds of pictures of attractive people who aren’t interested in us."
Everyone's mileage varies with online dating. Perhaps your negative experiences with online dating have more to with your gloomy outlook and apparent penchant for sweeping generalizations.
32
@Randall my experience was the opposite. I met my husband online, and I have two friends who met spouses years ago through newspaper dating (before internet) ads. They both have been married over 25 years.
21
@Randall - If I were you I'd get a little coaching from a friend or professional. There are likely little tweaks you can make to your photos, your bio, how you interact to messages and on the first few dates that could produce a better response. Think of it how you would a job. If you sent out that many resumes with such a limited response, would you not try and get someone to provide input?
58
You are in your thirties. If you are over 50, it is a lot of work for very little reward. I had many men tell me I was too old for them, despite the fact that I was ten years younger than they were. I have had multiple men say that it was cool that I worked for a government agency because I must have a good pension. Sorry, not worth it.
442
100 percent agree. My most recent foray into the online world brought me out for coffee one Saturday morning in spring with someone whose pictures were obviously taken a long time ago, whose ‘career in emergency medicine’ was not and MD or nurse but ER tech (the guys who wheel the gurneys—no objection at all to blue collar, only to the dishonesty), who told me about his opioid addiction within the first five minutes of our date and then continued speaking without ever asking a single question about me, who grew angry when I apologized for looking at a text on my phone, and who then ghosted ME.
I decided at that point enough was enough. Every significant relationship I’d had in the past occurred IRL, and I figured I’d be better off hoping for another bit of synchronicity from the universe, and otherwise enjoying the life I’d created for myself on my own.
196
In my world, it has been nothing but disappointments on eHarmony (the last woman who even bothered to reply six months ago was obviously looking for someone to wine and dine her, but nothing more) and POV (they never reply and I'm told most of the profiles are fake). I was even the potential victim of a scam on Match last year before I reported "her" (I'm not sure who or where the person was I was communicating with) and the profile was taken down. I'm polite, fit, educated, have a great job, own my own home, love to cook, multilingual, love music (I play the flute), and everything else I'm told women of a certain age (i.e., over 50) want...and cannot so much as get anyone to respond to my initial contacts or greetings. With nothing but rejection in my experience, when the two subscriptions expire next month, I'm giving up on online dating forever!
39
@jfdenver
I'm 5' 7" and have had similar comments about my height (I'm too short). Or, I've seen a lot of profiles (in NYC) that say "be over 6 feet" or "be taller than me in heels."
Men want women who are 5 to 10 years younger and who are thinner than they are. Women want men who are taller (if only by two or three inches) and who earn a higher income. If you target men who are 5 to 10 years older, you'll have better luck. I know that women who are taller than I am are very, very unlikely to respond to me. It's also true of colleges. Most women want a man from a higher ranked college. I've seen wedding announcements in which the woman is from an Ivy and the man is from a much lower school, but the man is always very tall or very successful.
These "always" seem especially true online. In real life, they are applied with less rigor.
18
Ms. Smyth, if you've had 86 dates in 3 years it seems you are not being very selective with your preferences. The degree to which you are selective is inversely proportional to the number of "likes" you'll get. So if you tighten up your preferences, you'll get fewer dates but dates of higher quality (i.e., closer to the characteristics you want), and you probably won't have to put up with so many guys who live in their cars, are drug-addicted, or revel in sending pix of their own anatomy.
Take it from one who knows.
17
@Tom
I think you're missing the point. It doesn't sound like the author is looking to jump back into marriage and is confused why she hasn't found someone. It sounds like she's taking time to enjoy meeting diverse people. She's accomplishing her goal beautifully.
46
@Tom I'm not particularly sure that this is what the author wants. Sounds like she is having a great time with her options wide open!
5
I loved it. Beautifully written and it just might get me to try
on-line dating.
2
Few things in life are as sad as loneliness. Internet dating services have done a wonderful service despite the myriad of stories of bad experiences. I don't know the statistics regarding how many dates it typically takes to find one's mate but I suspect the author of this piece who has met 86 men is an anomaly. The idea that she has a sobriquet for each of them is hilarious.
2
Wait. A young, beautiful, talented writer enjoys success in the dating world?
My God, technology is absolutely incredible.
It's a wonderful article, but the perspective of this newspaper never fails to astonish. The Bee Gees really did put it best:
It's all right, it's okay
And you may look the other way;
We can try to understand
The New York Times' effect on man.
16
If you live in a city, online dating is probably not that bad of an experience. It is so much more difficult in the suburbs.
4
Absolutely it will enlarge your world - coffee with a doctor, with a speech writer for the chief of police, with a secretary for the Secretary-General of the UN.... waitresses, professors, jobless artists, musicians. I never would have met such interesting people, where...in a bar? Yeah, I drank a lot of coffee.... But after three years with my picture out there, I'm now married 9 years and counting!
14
Really nicely written. I dont agree at all about the loss of self in marriage. But its nice to read something by a self-described writer who can actually write well.
10
@Paul Rosenberg I completely agree with you that the writer does an excellent job. I am writing to raise for your consideration the possibility that one's gender makes a difference in how marriage affects one's self-perception. Perhaps things have changed over time, perhaps not, but women have for ages built their lives around a man. One seldom hears of men building their lives around a woman to a similar extent. Economic self-sufficiency may alter these facts but society is slow to change. I am tempted to elaborate but will not succumb. Liked your compliment sandwich.
3
This is a great article and I have suffered the same consequences, yet I plod on, thinking there must be someone out there like me. After all, I'm there! And I'm gay, and I can tell you that maybe it's worse in the gay world - it's not what they like but what's coming around the corner that they like better.
4
@Andrew don't lose hope but do something different. There are a lot of experts who do good work helping people find love online. Find a couple coaches and/or authors that you trust and research how you can improve your profile; write better emails and texts; make different choices; and how you show up on dates. It's not that you're doing anything wrong or that anything is wrong with you. It's just that this is a whole new way of dating and mating and there are new skills to be learned.
The vast majority of gays and lesbians meet online. You can do it too!
"If I stumble upon one more man who seeks a “partner in crime,” one more “sapiosexual” or “entrepreneur,” I fear I will stomp on my phone. Worse still are the car selfies and nephew pics; the weird proliferation of taco and pizza emojis; the men who take it upon themselves to tell you who you are — “a girl who takes care of herself,” naturally, which always reads to me like a thinly-veiled threat. And above all the ghosting."
Substitute niece pics for nephew pics, and you're describing the majority of women's profiles I encounter. So many of the profiles I encounter are snapshots in insecurity and low self-esteem. For example, in the category of "The Art of the Cliché," you neglected to mention the over-the-top use of photo filters that, on the abundance of women's profiles anyway, render their complexion smoother and less wrinkled than that of newborn baby's coupled with Japanese anime-sized eyes. And lying about one's age -- sometimes shaving off a solid decade -- hardly sets the stage for establishing trust. For the most part I see women yearning for connection more than serial adventures, but neither sex knows how to convey that effectively and their profiles make that more challenging because there's a perceived need to sell oneself wonderful, having arrived in the world, and not to be missed. Lots of cog-dis going on.
13
@stephen Hilarious. I met my wife on match and haven't been on in quite a while but those are classic cliches. The one that always killed me was the gal looking for a guy who could go from jeans to black tie in the same day.
6
@DatMel Yes, and the female analog boast is that they can go from flats to heels effortlessly. In all of my decades on the planet I've never once heard a guy -- anywhere in real life, in a book, or in a movie -- talk about being attracted to women who can rock a pair of Nikes *and* heels. If men are from Mars, Women are from Manolo Blahnik.
1
Such a great piece. Thank you.
2
Online dating allowed me to become nearly emotionally bulletproof - which I consider a good thing.
The process can be pretty rough, but once you realize that a rejection often has little to do with you and everything to do with what the other person is looking for, you can learn to not take it personally, and to even laugh in the face of it. Or at least I could; as Nietzsche said, what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger!
I've been on one dating site or another now for more than 20 years, and I've actually made a couple of good female friends as part of the process - even if none of them became the long-term romantic relationship that I thought I was looking for.
At this point, I see dating sites as a networking tool, nothing more. You never know when a person capable of knocking your socks off might suddenly come across your profile, and I figure that you have to be in the game if you want to increase your opportunities to win.
9
@Matthew Carnicelli
I'm sorry, but you've been on dating sites for TWENTY YEARS? I'm happy you made two friends in that time, but something is amiss.
3
The internet was not a thing when I was single, and I still managed to date a lot of different people, eventually meeting my wife. How did we do it back then? We went up and talked to people. You flirted. If there was a connection, we exchanged phone numbers. At school, at the grocery store, at work, in a bar, at church, coffee shop... You name it. It worked. If I were ever single again, I'd probably do the same thing. It seems more fruitful than what folks are going through online.
9
"For weeks I had been holed up in my family’s empty summerhouse, writing, and I worked all that day, caught up in a kind of luxuriant self-consciousness that has since become familiar — that acute sense of self and solitude that binding oneself to an outsider can at times unleash."
Gosh, I think this is everyone's dream :)
2
My hands off to this person for continuing on this path after 86 tries (although I can’t help but question what she is searching for as well).
I went through a painful separation and eventual divorce in 1984 after a 7 year marriage. I wrote a personal ad (Listed in a supermarket/liquor store glossy bi-weekly magazine) in 1985. The first response from the woman who would become my wife came in the first batch of letters received on my birthday in April of 1985. We talked a couple of times on the phone and she sounded very nice (she had a lovely voice). We arranged to meet the following week. But a couple of days before, I called to confirm, and she said that she had met someone and wanted to see where it took her. I was disappointed, but knew this might happen and wished her well. I thought that was the end of that. I went on many one-time dates where it was clear that there wasn’t any chemistry. There were two women up to that point (a few weeks later), that I had seen several times, one of whom I really liked and could see a possible long-term relationship with her. Then in mid-June, the woman who had met someone else wrote again, asking if I would consider trying again. I wasn’t going to, but my sister talked me into it. We met a couple of weeks later, liked each other (the other one wanted to meet others, she placed her own ad in the same magazine), fell in love, moved in together in 1986 and married in March of 1988. We are still together today.
17
You were very lucky!
1
Spontaneous excursions to Montreal, Jamaica, and Barcelona?
For the unacquainted, I can assure you that the Tinder experience is largely bereft of spontaneity and foreign travel.
72
I’m young, 20, and raised in the generation of constant internet access- and constant warnings of “stranger danger” from things like “catfishing” to kidnapping.
I don’t know how often those things happen, but all the same I worry about the safety of my friends who are seeing 3 profile pictures and swiping in a particular direction before sending a few messages with a stranger and meeting up.
7
@L Brown
I never swipe on profiles without any bio. People certainly can lie (age, body type, hair loss, education), but, with some information (college name, workplace, biographical details), one can usually tell whether a profile is real of fake. Dating apps minimize information.
Kidnapping happens, if you don't meet in public. For people over 21, there's always the option to meet in a crowded bar or restaurant. Just don't go to someone's hotel room.
3
I'm glad this author sees online dating as an adventure, and perhaps her age & occupation are a help to this perspective, but for me, a 25 year old woman whose never been in a serious relationship, but wants one, online dating is time-consuming, semi-dangerous, and often soul-crushing.
The last online date I went on took 2 weeks of messaging and swiping to obtain & then when I got there my date had mis-represented himself (he didn't look like his photos). To make matters worse, after I told him I wasn't interested in seeing him again, he tracked me down to try to convince me to change my mind even though I had unmatched him. I thought back to all the time I had spent, not just messaging him, but all the other people who I didn't go on a date with, and wished that I had been reading, practicing guitar, hanging out with my friends, writing poetry, or lesson planning (I'm a teacher) instead. Sure, online dating is a way to meet people who would otherwise pass you by, but many of those people are duds, and have very little to offer. I'd rather spend time with my friends.
44
@Regina Napolitano The idea the online dating allows us to see other human beings as "duds" is terrifying to me.
1
The online app we used to meet 17 years ago (Matchmaker) is evidently no longer a thing, but we still are. We melded two households each with two boys of precisely the same ages. By all measures, it should have been a disaster, but we've created quite a family.
I had my share of absolutely weird dates (him wresting the NYT X-word out of my hands so he could complete it himself), and I instantly deleted queries from men who couldn't spell, dreamed of cuddling by the fireplace, or whose favorite scene was the deli in "When Harry Met Sally."
I applaud Ms. Smyth for putting herself out there - whatever her motivations. True love may be just around the corner. Or a lifelong friend. Or a (thinly disguised, I hope) novel.
7
A beautifully polished stone, with lovely insights. Thank you. And here’s to the next 86 ;-)
8
Been there, done that, done.
Still single- neither happy, nor unhappy. Just right.
15
86 men in three years? That's more than one every other week. That may be clue about a difficulty in forming and maintaining relationships. I'd be investing in examining myself instead of bounding the pavement on dates.
17
One every other week is not pathological in any way. It’s not very gracious to criticize someone who has generously shared her experience and vulnerability.
98
@Nola-
Shared her vulnerabilities?
More like shared her STDs...
3
@Nola. You make it sound like she’s done us a favor or performed some admirable feat. Sounds like high behiour to me. Aside from the morality of her behiour, she put herself at all kinds of risk: health risk and security risk, to name a few.
1
I've given it a try and now have a budding romance. My first date was the most amusing. I had talked on the phone with a widow two times and we agreed to meet for dinner. We had a nice meal and afterwards my date excused herself to use the restroom. She never came back. I waited 20 minutes or so and asked a waitress to check for her. GONE. I was very amused but waited another 20 or so minutes in case she had gone to her car or on some other adventure. I wondered if it was me or the suspicion I had during our meal that she was not over becoming a widow and not ready to date. We have never reconnected so her motivates will remain a mystery. I have meet some very nice people but very few I would pursue for a long-term partnership (maybe not too long since I'm a senior citizen). I also meet a number of liars. These people also left me amused. What kind of rube would think an eighty plus year old appearing person who looked nothing like their photo was in their late fifties? The world has changed and online dating is a worthwhile experience.
21
I met my wonderful husband online at 55, the morning after deciding I would waste no more of my time with online dating services and turn them off. The best advice my friends who had been through the online dating experience were: 1.) Make a written list of the qualities you are seeking in a partner, and the life changes you are and are not willing to make in order to have a relationship. 2.) Don't waste a lot of time corresponding with people. There are a lot of dishonest people who know how to use the written word to be seductive. 3.) If the person seems to have potential, arrange to have coffee in a public place. Within 15 minutes you should be able to figure out if you ever want to see this person again as long as you live. (Don't forget about the list.) 4.) Men who write "I'm sixty, and look like I'm forty" usually are looking for women who are twenty.
I contacted my husband because we seemed to have shared values and interests, and he looked like someone who could be an interesting friend even if he didn't turn out to be a romantic partner. Happily he lived two miles away and turned out to be both!
82
@Deb
As someone who is in his early sixties, and online dated for two years, No 1 is the most important. I have enough stories to fill a book, but until you are honest with yourself and what changes you are you are wiling to make, nothing will ever work out long term.
Follow 2 and 3.
Anything that is a deal breaker should be part of your profile. (Yes, I do read everything in your profiles.)
1
@Deb
"Men who write "I'm sixty, and look like I'm forty" usually are looking for women who are twenty."
Love it!
6
@Deb So true about correspondence. Altho not on line dating now, before I wasted much time texting/ chatting .
When the rubber was to meet the road, there were suddenly excuses, disappearances, illnesses.
The best option is to meet as soon as possible and eliminate the time wastes and non committed people.
1
What an interesting and fun article to read! The article and the comments (which I feel are the best because I learn so much) make me feel that I'm not alone in this lonely and disheartening process of dating. Couple of my friends and I are in our mid-to-late 30s and single and accomplished (we all are either working on our our PhDs, MDs, or are similarly accomplished in other fields). We are single, attractive and smart and normal (I like to believe) living in Chicago but I don't understand why it is so difficult to meet a right partner.=.
It doesn't help that we grew up before and during social. It's difficult to still get to terms with online dating when we have dated (traditionally) in real life during college or grad school but now it's difficult to meet except online. Some of my friends are deleting dating accounts because online dating is draining and depressing.
My friends and I are not stuck to our phones and have varied interests and would love to meet men in real life. I know there are tons of single men out there but do men don't look up anymore or express interest in-person or are not used to doing that anymore?
31
@PalXX-There are some great "how to" books, worth reading (forget the cheesy titles). And the wisdom shared is solid and really works:
Getting to 'I Do' - by Dr. Pat Allen
Searching for Courtship - by Dr. Winnifred Cutler
It's a Guy Thing - by David Deida
Intimate Communion - by Dr. David Deida
Undefended Love - by ....
Sounds like you have the makings of a TV series or a book with 86 chapters. I can see how the pure tourism of it all can become an end in itself.
30
Well done! Great writing. I can so relate as I work out of the home too and have few opportunities to meet men. I was 53 when I divorced and I was so happy there were ways to find dates that didn't depend on bumping into a prospect in the frozen food section or at the dog park. (Does that happen anyway?!) I too have met a lot of interesting men I wouldn't have met otherwise and had some adventures (though not nearly as exciting as the author's?) Yes, it can be demoralizing but it's also fun--most of the time-- although I am tired of seeing profile photos of men in impossible yoga positions that have traveled to 52 countries and counting or those that claim to work out daily or are God-fearing or hate drama - isn't life drama? I often think that online dating is a sociologist's dream. It's amazing how much you can tell about a person's personality and values just by a few photos and a paragraph of text...I'm taking a break now though as I'm enjoying my solitude at the moment. But, I'm glad it's there...always nice to have options.
28
Well written piece, with a take on things that I share. The comments, together with the article, leave the strong impression that those who find the most satisfaction in online dating are the ones who approach it with the right attitude of adventure and curiosity about other people ... an attitude the author clearly has.
Yes, you may want desperately to find a partner. It's an honest longing, and a legitimate one. But too often that desperation and end-goal-oriented attitude is a turnoff if worn too loudly on the sleeve. More than it's effect on others though, it can result in one closing oneself to the possibility of adventure as soon as they decide that they won't be growing old with someone. I wouldn't say anyone should have "lower" expectations ... just different ones. Expect to have interesting conversation and maybe make a friend, and you might. Expect to try a restaurant or go to a club you've been wanting to try, and you will. Expect to meet your life parter and nothing less, and the overwhelming majority of the time you will be disappointed.
39
@Ryan
Aptly put. You're right. Like my friend told me her mother gave her this perspective on dating: You'll either have a great story or a great date!
17
This is an unfortunate article. Well written, but unfortunate nonetheless. I say this having now witnessed at close quarters the perilous, even reckless life decisions that can arise from online dating. The reason is that often the key ingredient of online dating is desperation. Rebounding from a terrible relationship or even a bad marriage can drive people to see things that are not there, hear things that are not there, and feel things that are self-created illusions—all because of the vagaries that are created by distance, photos, and telephones. It is almost inevitable that, after having many hours-long telephone conversations with an essentially unknown person, a form of phony intimacy will arise. It is no stretch to see that a meeting of these people will find them desperate to make good on that illusion, even if the emotional costs are eventually ruinous. Online dating may have some successes in the world, but I would bet that there are many more debacles based on a human nature that can be self-destructively needy at the worst moments.
40
@PaulM Thank you for this post. I'm copying it and printing it out for future reference. Very astute.
5
@PaulM
I think your perspective is out dated (or possibly only applies to older people). Online dating has become the main way that people in their 20's and 30's meet, most are not desperate in the least. I don't know anyone who has hours long telephone calls before going on a real life date, it's typically a few texts and then going out for a meal. I know lots of married people who met online and I'm in a longterm relationship that started there as well.
16
Agree. A brief phone call or two should be enough to know if you want to meet. If one party keeps putting off getting together that’s a red flag.
4
As a technology baby boomer I tried online dating sites after I was widowed 10 years ago. There were ups and downs and learned what "ghosting" was. Immature behavior exists whether one is a teenager or a 60+. Still the experience has been fun and after kissing a lot of frogs - I met someone who is my best friend and life long companion. Without the dating site we met on our paths would have never crossed. Ever. And yet we had mutual acquaintances and lived in the same city. We have no plans to get married but that is okay - as boomers we have a lot of life to live and enjoy where we are. As for online dating - I recommend them especially for older folks because while it takes work, it can be fun and by the time you are older like I am, the ups are great for your self esteem and the downs are nor catastrophic - I figure, his loss! Things have a way of working out.
22
My thanks to Ms. Smyth for an entertaining and informative slice of life article. You'd think with the dating "disasters" she'd be bitter but, thankfully, she remains optimistic about the online dating process It is a process that she navigates with self-awareness, a bit of humor, and realistic expectations. Brava!
10
Online dating led to me to the love of my life!
Every single day is filled with love and happiness. I never in my life thought I could find a man like my Paul, but there he was on my computer screen.
Get some good therapy, then go looking for someone similarly therapized, and you too may find your dream come true!
17
I was widowed after a 35 year marriage. I started online dating with my daughter as my role model and coach. After several blah and bizarre dates I decided to quit. It was at that point that a man messaged me and sparked my curiosity. We met, talked for hours and have been married for six years. You just never know when or how your ‘person’ will cross your path.
281
@ED I, too, was widowed after a long marriage and joined an online dating site at age 65. I met the man I'm living with ten years ago; he was the fifth and last guy I dated. I found the experience to be lots of fun, probably because all I wanted was somebody to go to dinner with other than my sister or my girlfriends - I certainly got more than I bargained for! You're right, ED, you just never know ....
3
Gee. I liked the boat builder with the beautiful furniture who brought you tea and roses! Sometimes, women chase the elusive, unavailable men and reject the nice guys. He sounded like a keeper. But, I wasn’t there....
I met my husband of twenty-five years at a singles weekend in CT. An unlikely match, as I’m over twelve years older, but it works. There’s something mystical about the search for “the one.” Just know that as you’re working on yourself, getting ready for forever relationship, there’s someone out there, working on themselves, getting ready for you!
28
I went online after a bad breakup and was contacted by a former boyfriend who saw me on the dating site. We've been (back) together ever since and very happy.
7
Last fall I had the joy and honor of being at my son's wedding to a woman he met on an online dating site three years earlier. Early on, I knew that this was a solid and lasting relationship, and continues to be strong as nails. They have had adventures in many countries as well as many locales around the U.S., not to mention in Brooklyn, where they live. This is all to say that while online dating sites can provide the stimulating variety that being with many partners can provide, it apparently can also produce a partner with whom growth can continually blossom in depth. So I am grateful for it, as you are, Katharine, just coming from a different angle.
6
Laughed out load at the "sapiosexuals" comment. Every other profile I see from women on Bumble is using this term. When and why did it become popular? It's ridiculous. When I see, I swipe left. Thanks for an engaging and enjoyable. For the moment, I'm less disheartened by the prospect of browsing through profiles, setting up a date, and telling my life story once again.
17
don't forget "open to non-monogamy" which is also ubiquitous
5
@mahenrytx going to google sapiosexual
3
I'm a male, I did what you've been doing in my 20's & 30's. In my 40th year I settled down, got married, had kids. At age 59, divorced. The highest percentage of divorces is age 55 and up. I have zero interest in playing the "Field". Just a companion to laugh, play, commiserate, and to share our families together with each other.
I've been out with 3 women, all excellent and we've all had great adventures beyond our initial greet & meet. I'm pretty sure I'm either lucky or just much less likely to think the grass is greener on the other side. My minimal dating at an advanced age is pure preservation, You are a hoot, and as chaotic as I thought juggling three dates in two years has been, this story has made me feel like a piker. Thank you for letting me know it can get crazy again if I just say yes to everybody! See how we are? X. There's 7 brands of Coke, 500 different kinds of cigarettes. See how we are.
19
@SheHadaTattooToo
True love is the Devil's crowbar.
A very well written piece, with a metaphor showing a great awareness of the oneness - the lack of duality, ultimately - of self and other.
I guess everybody is looking to inhabit the "so" in "every so often"; the wonder, the thrill, the bliss, the loving reassurance of life lived True.
1
I'm looking forward to the days when marrying your high school sweetheart is viewed as anachronistic--not romantic. Online dating allows people to find others with similar interests,life goals and values. For the person living in a small town,working full time,your options and opportunities are limited. You have to find someone and hope they mold into the person you want to be with--most here can attest to how "successful" that is. Not to say that online dating doesn't come with a panoply of problems itself;namely is the person even real. Maybe we could abolish the question "How did you guys meet?" from our vernacular. That would help those happily married couples in arranged marriages--who dread that that question,too.
7
Loved reading this. When a divorce left me single at 39, I despaired, but after a few years of dating (online and otherwise), I became more confident in myself and I eventually met the man who is now my husband. I found online dating to be a more effective way to meet compatible people than "in the wild." It's good to keep a positive attitude, but also have realistic expectations and be savvy about scams!
19
As another thirtysomething soul wandering in the dark, this essay resonated with me. After a painful break-up last fall, I glumly and begrudgingly turned to The Apps.
And while I've yet to find the woman of my dreams, I've had some great times with others who are experiencing the same bouts with loneliness, existential mortality, and other demons of singledom.
What a relief to know we're all in transition! It's probably not a coincidence that many of the women I've met just bought a new mattress or are contemplating moving to new apartment or getting a dog. The enduring thing we all have in common is the exhausting task of learning to find ourselves again.
In this internet age marked by increasing isolation, it's a relief and a joy to connect with a fellow struggler. Even if just for a glass of wine or two.
105
this is a beautifully written piece and also rings so me so true. I have recently started online dating after a failed marriage and I've only been doing it for a couple months but the author's description is exactly right. It does not feel like I'm ever actually going to meet a person I will fall in love with. but I'm already feeling the boundaries of my world expanding and seeing different perspectives.
I will only note that for a guy, this is an extremely expensive process because try asking the girl to pay or split the first date. That would be my only complaint. Otherwise, I am also taking my own notes but I am only on number 6.
23
I did a lot of online dating for about three years until I found my Wonderful Wife five years ago. But I was able to cut expenses by always making the first encounter either a cup of coffee or one drink. That not only allowed me to bail when the vibe just wasn’t right, but it also helped to build anticipation for encounter number two when it was. Oh, and I found that it was always best to end the first encounter with “ thanks, I had a nice time.” Rather than “Can I see you again?” I found that it was always best to reflect on the next move. Plus, I found that most women do not appreciate when you guys make them selves too available.
12
@paul
Back when I was on the apps, I learned pretty quick that first dates have to be cheap. Coffee, drinks, hikes, etc.
Met my wife on Tinder, after two and a half years of dealing with the apps. Our first date: ice cream and a walk on the Mall.
5
and WHEN you finally meet that person that splits the bill...CHEERS!!!!!
1
Life can be shared with a spouse, a partner, children ,friends and/or grandchildren...The notion that a "pairing" is better than all the others is ridiculous. Especially, when it leads to loneliness. But, for those who date via the internet I must say, be an adult. Do not ghost. Don't be a coward or dismissive. Call the person or write to them and tell them what you're thinking...or why. Be a mensch. There are many fish in the sea for sure...but every fish should be valued.
105
You can call it "ghosting," I call it being rude.
If you don't have the courage (maturity) to say good-bye, so-long, I'm-not-interested; you should at least be self-revelatory enough to state it in your profile: "Warning: I will stop seeing you w/o advanced notice. Proceed at your own risk."
115
@Aristotle
I agree! I don't think I have ever ghosted anyone and now I have become very assertive and let the guy know along the lines of "This was so lovely and thank you for having coffee/wine. I feel we aren't a great match but wish you all the best of luck in your search". Some respond and some just end the conversation. haha. It's annoying to be ghosted (and I have been ghosted so many times) but I know that at least I'm living up to my standards of not being rude.
40
@PalXX I do the same. Sometimes there's a mutual fade and that's fine, but I feel that if there's a date or invitation pending, I owe them the courtesy of a response (and I would hope for the same).
9
I absolutely abhor ghosting. There’s nothing more inconsiderate. Don’t want to hear from me? Fine, have the courtesy and consideration to tell me one-to-one.
2
Thank you for sharing your journey. Dating is increasingly difficult work, and an adventure, in this day when people are increasingly disassociated from each other. Given this disassociation, online dating exposes us to many more people whom we would not have an opportunity to meet. Please don't give up. I met my beautiful wife 16 years ago on an online site. Even though we both lived in the same city, I would never have met her except through the site.
12
This is a book, not just an article! Would love to read about these adventures that expanded your world in a longer format.
19
@John Fox The book is coming.
@John Fox
There is a book you might enjoy: Jane Juska’s A Round Heeled Woman. A much older woman, but similar search for intimacy and self
Online dating works best if you're under 40. At 70, my recent milestone, it's a form of torture.
74
Worked wonderfully for me from 45-47. At 47, I met my current gf/partner. We recently celebrated our 6th Anniversary together. We love each other and live together and are making plans for our golden years...
@Bret Primack
2
@Bret Primack-Please don't give up. I am in my 60s and will be celebrating my 5th wedding anniversary next week with my wonderful husband, whom I met on Match after a year and a half of online dating. The process isn't always fun, but the goal is worth it. Good luck to you.
10
I found love online at 49 years and three months, with a man imminently 59 years of age. I feel grateful that in reading my profile, he chose to ignore what he says is the going rule for men, ‘halve your age and add seven [years].’
In three months on Match.com, I received a substantial number of messages from men in their mid-70’s. When I wrote to simply thank one gentleman, an accomplished judge, for his lovely note, he accused me of age discrimination. I couldn’t help but write him back again—but not for the purpose of accepting the dinner invitation he’d extended, I promise you!
If you are only looking at women in their 40s and 50s, I beg you to soften your search parameters. Ageism is pernicious, I think every woman on this board will agree.
6
Oh, how I miss the Craigslist personals...a casualty of misguided, lazy legislation.
8
In January of 2002, I was a few months away from my 51st birthday - and had never been married --
A string of relationships - some longer than others - had all ended with both parties drifting apart --
On this January evening - I was standing at a major subway and bus hub, here in New York City - waiting for a colleague to pick me up in his car on our way to a rehearsal --
As I stood there waiting for my friend - a large crowd of evening commuters began to gather as they made their transfers from subway to bus --
Standing next to me was a very nice woman - and we began to engage in some friendly, idle chit-chat --
You know - the typical stuff - "Yes, I'm a musician and that's my instrument" -- "Yes, I'm on my home from my job in midtown" -- "Oh - I know some people who work there as well" --
After about fifteen or twenty minutes of this, my friend drove up in his car -- I jumped in and we drove away --
That was January, 2002 --
We were married in September of 2005 - and will be celebrating our 14th anniversary next month --
I was married for the first time at the age of 54 -- and it was her second --
So -- something to keep in mind --
While you're standing on line at Starbuck's - or Chick-Fil-A - or Whole Foods -- with your head buried in your phone -- keep in mind that the person standing right next to you - could be the soul mate for whom you have been searching on the dating apps --
The only problem is -- you actually have to talk to them - in person...
873
I'm a millennial. I'll just be awkward and ask for her SnapChat handle;then communicate primarily through emojis afterwards.
50
@Howard G I'll second this!
I'm 35, and have been on plenty of online dates. Some good, some bad, but never that turned into anything serious.
I've made an effort to ask people out on dates. As in saying, "Can I ask you out on a date?"
Of course I've been rejected, but everyone I've asked is immensely flattered to have been asked out, and many of those asks have turned into relationships of various lengths and time.
Putting a phone in your face takes you out of the "real" world.
Engage with people. Allow yourself to be vulnerable. Ask people out on dates.
If anything, after the exchange, you'll at least walk away with the satisfaction that you asked, rather than hid behind your phone.
90
@Howard G Thank you for sharing your story! Life is very random. I had been expanding my horizons through online dating and gone out with different kinds of men, but not anything long term. My fiance and I met sitting at the same table at a hotel. One and a half years later I moved to his city and after three years together we will be married soon. My dating advice to single people would be to try everything, be open and get out of your comfort zone, and try to have FUN. I know many people who met their spouses online.
26
I am profoundly grateful for the world of online dating. At 67, a recently divorced woman with an at-home business, the chances were almost zero of meeting a partner in the more usual ways. I hung in there for 2 years, grew accustomed to the ghosting and the frequent scam messages (about 10 a week from men obviously hoping that 'older' also meant 'rich and desperate') and finally - finally - met the great love of my life. I cherish every day and every hug with this very special man, all the more precious at this late stage of life.
168
@PSM Congrats. Lovely to hear something positive here.
14
I don't drink, and I'm shy. I have a very hard time flirting. When my first husband left, I used online dating services. I echo the sentiment in this article. It wan't always perfect, but I had some great adventures.
Then I met the right man on Plenty of Fish. Ten years together and counting.
40
Sounds awful.
10
Jeez, being a woman in 2019 does seem to have its perks. 86 dates. Men just get the ghosting part. If they’re lucky. At least the men that aren’t boat builders cum amateur joiners and inhabit the real world.
5
Very nice piece. What a wonderful perspective on online dating! As they say, perspective is everything, no? I just may decide to try out online dating once again, keeping what you wrote in mind. ;-)
11
Really loved reading this piece. Especially this part: "But I soon noticed that the flip side to the disappointment of each mismatch or aborted romance was a mounting sense of strength and self-sufficiency, a hardening of character, a greater understanding of the woman I am when I’m intact." Cheers to that!
37
And also the part about how marriage is not a completion but a dilution.
4
I will be happily married to my wife for 45 years next month. The concept of online dating was irrelevant to me. That is, until my wife’s sister got married for the first time at age 57 to a widower who lived half way across the state from her. They would never have met without online dating and, to see them now, completely (or almost) simpatico has made me a convert. Since then we have seen a long time friend who had gone through divorce struggle with dating until she met her new guy on line several years ago. They were married last year. Another long time friend, widowed for almost ten years, met a guy from the same town, someone she never wouldhave met without online dating. My niece (32) is engaged to a guy she met online, my daughter’s best friends married after meeting on line as well. To me you have to concede that times have changed and you’ve gotta change with them.
126
@Greg a My guess is that you work for one of those online dating sites and are trying to promote them. I, on the other hand, have had great success IRL, but not on those online dating sites. Meeting IRL is so much easier, especially in a large metropolitan area. What you see is what you get. No doctored ancient pictures. No fake profiles.
2
Thank you for sharing Katharine. I sometimes feel sorry for myself because I've dated 47 women through online sites, and I really only want one. But compared to you I'm an amateur! Online dating has its problems, but it sure beats hitting on women in the grocery store, which I refuse to do, and bars aren't a practical option when you don't drink alcohol...
7
@Pajama Sam There's nothing wrong with 'hitting on women' in the grocery store, etc., so long as it's done in a natural and not sleazy/pickup-y manner. I've met some nice men on the street (while we were both standing on the sidewalk observing a street basketball game)... in the supermarket.... while seated side-by-side at a restaurant dining counter, etc.
I've always felt that for the most part, online dating is like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Many people seem to be trying to force something to work, that otherwise never would have even begun, had the two people met in the real world. I think online dating is most effective for people who have a 'goal' of getting married or a goal of having children. But for others who are just looking for a good match, both personality-wise and chemistry-wise, I find there's nothing like real world first meetings, and where both parties can instantly feel that spark. Or not.
22
@Pajama Sam
I go to bars all the time and drink water. I actually prefer it.
It was awhile back, with anonymous letters sent through the local weekly newspaper's Classified Section, that I met a dozen women I got along with on the phone, and who sounded promising. When we met in person at our rendezvous point, we could tell in two seconds if it could happen or not - in the parking lot, basically. Oddly, the only one who seemed nice was one who had specified she would Not sleep with someone on a first date. At our meeting (our first date), she told me she'd met someone at a dance the night before, slept with him, and now felt she was not single, and apologized. I said, "Why not see if this goes well - you don't really know if he will work out, and here I am (we'd just sat down). Why not see what I'm like in comparison?" She opted out, and we didn't even have dinner. I decided that if she was that different than the person she described, I was better off. A decade later, I met someone who answered My ad, and she seemed fine - but later it turned into a nightmare. She was sweet until we were committed as a couple - then she soured, in every way.
I've resisted the temptation since. I learned that "meeting" someone consists of Meeting them. I'm glad the author had so much time and money to spend on her quest, though.
I think that being introduced by a mutual friend is superior to any other "method." "Love at first sight" sounds great. of course - but in my world it's still a myth.
6
I guess that online dating is just another method to meet romantically-inclined people who are too busy to carry on an active social life. It may become the norm, if we insist in becoming workaholics, addicted to the office. Could it be that we are living stressful, anxious lives, somewhat isolated from a community's real gathering we used to take for granted in the not so distant past? Have we gotten too busy for our own good, racing towards a highly competitive professional success... at the cost of pausing a bit and 'get a life'?
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@manfred marcus well, once you retire (as I did at age 43), it can be quite challenging to meet someone. It was not because I was tied to an office, or too busy, or living a stressful, anxious life. It was because the venues to meet narrow when you age (relative to being in college or your early 20's). I met my husband online, who was also retired. We lived 22 miles from each other - but if not for online, we would never have met because where would we meet?
4
@manfred marcus
I work normal (9-5) hours, I have a very robust social life, live in a nice neighborhood where I know most of my neighbors. I am active in local organizations, play sports, etc. However, I almost rarely meet anyone in real life. At my age (39) all of my friends are married and don't have single friends. No one talks to me at the grocery store, and when I go out with friends, I'm more insterested in them than scanning the room for single guys. It's hard to meet someone.
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@Emily r How interesting, and disquieting, the little interest we have in getting to know our neighbor(s), saying hello when crossing the street, or in the subway, perhaps afraid of being misinterpreted, even afraid of a gentle touch (which defines us as social beings) that may lead to an awful torrent of 'potential abuse' (and other idiotic fabulations). This all speaks volumes of our isolated lives, especially when surrounded by the thousands of humans, likely thinking the same things that afflicts us in particular. Growing up in Bolivia, touch was of the essence, as a hand shake whenever we would meet a given. Here in America, it's the opposite sometimes (just to give myself some hope, sometimes not).
1
Ms Smyth, your article is endearing and refreshing. Finding joy with yourself and discovering fun in others is a gift.
Nearly 20 years ago my relationship with my daughter's father ended. She was 5 and my son was 12. The thought occurred to me that I needed to make my home feel like "home" again, after that long term fractious relationship. So I didn't go seeking any dating opportunities and spent 9 wonderful years being "mom", advancing my career, but also rediscovering the things about myself I had lost, including hobbies and interests.
My first foray into online dating happened with eharmony, which had matched several people I know in happy marriages. The first person I had a date with ended up being my current husband. Twelve years after our first date and eight years after our wedding, we are still together. We've lived up to our vows through the death of his daughter & my father and his cancer diagnosis.
People want to believe there is a "best way" to meet others. Not sure there is, but kudos to those that at least try to find joy in being alone or with others. Whatever works for you is your best choice.
85
I've never had much luck on dating sites, but this writing is beautiful.
28
I'm glad to hear that the writer has had such amazing adventures. I, on the other hand, have had a few good times and dozens of dates to which I should've brought my tax returns. I can't speak for any other location or age group, but in Manhattan, middle-aged women are mostly interested in ones financial situation. Not much chance of adventure here.
22
I was going to say, this is my life... definitely including the ghosting, and also finding a lifelong best friend through the process. (I suppose that alone makes it worth it.) But then I read about all the men the author has met, and all the adventures she has had as a result... that is not my life. Usually it's just drinks in a bar on a weeknight. Sometimes dinner.
15
As a man, there are several things wrong with online dating which make it problematic, but the most glaring is the possible lack of sexual attraction one may have with a potential female mate. One can only hope one will have it when they meet. Also, it seems for the most part, no matter the website target group: “rich white man” searching for “twenty-year old social scientist female grad with voluptuous body” – the context of the contact seems contrived. Some will say arrange marriages are a leap of faith, but online dating is not comparable to an arrange marriage of the past and present since these arrangements are made within a cultural vessel, layered with an ethnic layer, layered with a parental layer. I would never meet a woman online. I am from Generation X, and I still feel online dating screams of desperation and being too available. I have not seen any examples that have changed my mind regarding that fact.
7
A wonderful essay. Seventeen years ago tomorrow, I met Nancy through online dating, after a summer of meeting a string of women that I never wanted to see again. But there was something about Nancy I liked. The day after we met for dinner, we met for ice cream. Last month, we celebrated our 16th wedding anniversary. We are both in our 60s, and we are still in our honeymoon. It really can work.
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It’s worth noting on behalf of at least one man that Ms. Smyth’s experience and experiences with dating apps aren’t exclusive to women; gender reversed, I’ve lived through many of the same and empathize with all her sentiments, from dismay to joy to appreciation of horizons broadened.
27
(In particular the examples following, “If I stumble upon one more...” gave me comfort that someone other than me finds the app world something of a strange safari of trends in self identity.)
3
86 men and counting? I envy you! But I hope I can discover my own self and be wholesome way before that.
8
Online dating can also help hold the pheromones at bay. At 46 I was a widower with teenage children,a full time profession, and living in a sparsely populated area. Through online dating I was able to meet my future wife who was in a similar situation 100 miles away. Finding out we had almost identical libraries and being able to explore values before being blinded by pheromones and dopamine was helpful. Not to discount the rush of romance, however, building on a foundation of shared ideals and goals helps assure a long term journey together.
Another advantage for online dating, especially for the mid to later life single, is that it signals who is interested in partnership. There are older single people who "are done with that."
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@Gardening in WI I’m one of the older single people who “are done with that.” When my last relationship ended a decade ago, I knew I’d need a lot of time to recover — it had been a messy union that ended with his two-year-long illness & death. In the ten years since, I’ve never felt the urge to allow another man into my life; in fact, it would feel like an intrusion. However, I’m glad you were able to find love again; everyone has different goals.
18
Ms. Smyth, your cheery attitude and ability to put one foot in front of the other until the next date is wonderful.
While I had several on-line dating experiences, the last one, who ghosted me while I was on a family trip, ended my online dating experiences. I was so stunned about it that I stopping dating on line forever. Luckily, a great partner showed up within a year, unexpectedly.
I wish you continued positive experiences until you land with someone you can really treasure.
10
Thank you for this, I feel similarly about online dating. Personal safety and ghosting/poor behavior aside, it really is an interesting experience. Hope it pans out whatever way you would like it to!
3
Lovely piece, and bravo for finding value in the soul-crushing process of online dating. I suspect, though, that you possess an unwritten belief that you will, indeed, find the right person one day - otherwise I doubt you'd be able to continue mustering all the energy needed to power through over 80 dates in 3 years. For those of us who have been dating for a long time and are also older - I've dated on and off for over 10 years and I'm 60 - treating online dating as "a world-enlarging enterprise" was left behind long ago. I am doing this to find the right person to share my last life chapter with, not to accumulate amusing cocktail party stories, or, with all due respect, fodder for my next novel.
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@EMunson what a dismal comment! Just because you are 60, does not mean you have to give up on the spirit of adventure. My mother retained her energy and openness to the world until her untimely death at the (young) age of 73. And what’s wrong with telling amusing stories at a cocktail parties or writing novels? Maybe if you did more of that, you wouldn’t feel so gloomy. I can see how talk of the “last life chapter” can deter potential partners.
11
@EMunson-Bravo! My dating life changed when I decided I was more interested in courtship than dating. So I treated candidates as people worthy of my respect and getting to know--even if we only shared a handful of encounters. My intention was to practice being friendly and available and interesting and to leave better men in my wake by modeling courtship behavior. I understand we wanted the same outcome--to find a quality partner to build our dreams with. Fortunately, I met that man when I turned 50.
8
@Ann Love it, Ann, good for you! I will try to take your higher ground going forward.
1
I'm sure it certainly online dating expands upon the usual experience and has its value in terms of solidifying the self, and I'm assured also that you have survived those experiences and lived to tell the tale. However, at some point of appreciating dating for the sake of dating, given the range and variety, what of the dangers of it becoming a solipsistic exercise?
8
A great essay! I found my husband of ten years online. He lived in another country. He had a strange name. We met in a rundown hotel in Venice. And here we are! In my online dating career, I don’t think I topped the author’s count of 86 (though I came pretty close) nor did I meet anybody with cocaine-soaked keys (or maybe they just had the presence of mind to keep them from me). But I sympathize with the author’s cheerfulness, courage and good humor. Online dating opens the world to you. Enjoy!
71
This is a refreshingly optimistic account of the seemingly perilous world of online dating for those of us who are of a certain age. While I still feel somewhat skeptical about online dating, I feel more encouraged by Smyth's wise and healthy perspective about it. Thanks for publishing this.
26
If you can get people to express interest in you, I can see how online dating can enlarge one's world in a positive sense. For an average looking bloke such as myself, spending countless hours on openings that never get responses is only demoralizing.
188
@maa I know, right? I doubt I've dated 86 women in the 14+ years I've been on online dating.
8
@maa
It pays to be a creative writer I think.
5
All of my married friends are really pretty average looking. Nothing wrong, but none great specimens either. I don't think it's so important. Better to accept another person as another human being with flaws & sparkles alike.
3