Cherry Indigo

Guest Blog: Would you have sex with this man?

I joined an online dating service. I'd heard horror stories about them - match.com in particular. That it's a "woman catalog" that men troll through looking for a quickie. The worst part to me isn't that so much (hey, it's been a while) but more so that you don't have to join to be able to browse the merchandise. The idea of someone at my office trolling around and seeing my mug along with some semi-cutesy "here's why I'm date-able" made me nauseous. So I went the eHarmony route. That's the one with Dr. Neil Clark Warren, that kindly old gentleman on the commercials who says you'll find your soulmate on his service. And then those good looking people hang all over each other, showing their love through interpretive dance.

What I liked about the idea was that you fill out this fairly long questionnaire and the results are used to match you with others who have similar personality traits and values. You are then alerted you have a match - you only see the details of the people you've been matched with. I figured, any guy who'd take an hour to fill out this thing is going to be looking for more than a parking lot tryst.

I haven't been a member long, but I think I can draw a clear distinction between it and match.com - match is a sex site and eHarmony is a stepmom site. As in - I want to find a suitable partner for me and my kids. They all post pics of themselves with their children and wax poetic about how their kids are the most important things in their lives. Nothing wrong with any of that - it's better to know from the start. But as I've communicated with these men, I am finding that, while they want to find a woman who wants a commitment, they themselves are not committed to the process.

Bascially, you begin with a series of closed-ended questions, then proceed to open-ended ones before you enter "open communications" phase. You can ask your own questions, or use the ones they supply. But these guys take the shortest route every time - How is it that a guy can think the answer "Honest" is an adequate response to the question "What are the three best traits you have to offer a partner"?

They just want to jump to the open communications portion - then they start throwing their phone numbers at you. The whole point of the system is to find out if you are compatible before you meet. But they want the best of both worlds - sex with someone who thinks match.com is a sex site. (At this point, the good doctor has his fingers in his ears, doing the old "la la lah LA LAH - I can't heeeaar you"). They want to f*ck a nice girl, in other words. (Get the difibulators, stat - the dr's down!)

The jury is still out for me on this whole thing - I haven't found my soulmate yet (whatever that is) but I haven't been pulled back behind a dumpster yet either. Maybe if I take two aspirin, Mr. Right will call me in the morning.

posted by Cherry Indigo (Cindy) @ 2/20/2006 11:45:00 AM