I sent out my feelers, funny but brief hellos, into the online messaging world. The women I messaged were attractive, fit and smart, or, at least, they presented themselves as such. It’s hard to fake smart, especially after an interchange or two, but it turns out you can fake attractive and fit pretty easily, at least until the first date.

Several women replied despite the rather crappy pictures I posted in my profile. One thing I noticed quite quickly about myself was that I disliked when the woman didn’t carry the conversation forward at all. If her response to my little one-liner was a simple hello back, I immediately thought she was going to be too much work. There is only room for one taciturn person in a relationship and I already occupied that spot.

One woman caught my eye. She only had two pictures and they revealed a pretty, but not drop dead gorgeous, woman in her early fifties. She lived a few towns away. Her profile said she was athletic and her pictures confirmed she was. She wrote in her profile she loved life cuddling a good meal. No commas at all, so I wrote asking what it was like to cuddle a good meal. She answered good-humoredly and we were off on a two day chat, before she wondered in a message if I was ever going to ask for her number. And so I did. And after a day or so of texting, she asked if we were ever going to go out.

Now Cindy-not her real name- is an avid runner. And I am a walker. We agreed to go for a nice little walk in her hometown. We met by the railway station. I was a little early and waited for her on a bench. I dressed casually and she dressed athletically. She was every bit as pretty and fit as she appeared in her pictures. She wore black Lycra with the see-through patches and her top was low cut revealing very, very firm, good-sized breasts. I’m thinking c-cups.

We went for our walk and an hour passed quickly. We talked about her job as a lawyer and mine as a construction supervisor. Our children were another conversation source. I’m a firm believer in setting a short time limit on the first date. One can always extend, if it’s going well, which is what I did. We went another mile or two, talking like old friends, nary an awkward pause.

We got back to the station, had some water, and took a seat at bench. I had a feeling quite quickly that she wanted to kiss there and then, if I wanted, but I didn’t, mostly because PDAs are not my thing. Also, who wanted to see two upper middle-aged people making out. I’ve often felt the least sexy scene I’ve ever witnessed was Jack Nicholson kissing Diane Keaton in Something’s Gotta Give. After a lot of close proximity and arm touching, I really wanted to let my hormones have their evil way, but resisted somehow. We parted with a sweet kiss on the lips. She placed her hand on my cheek and I was smitten for sure.

#onlinedating #middleaged #manspov #middleageddating #lastfirstkiss

This may go a bit deeper than I have before. A little discomfort isn’t always bad though. Have you ever met a person who was completely unbiased, unprejudiced, completely open to any person? Of course you haven’t. Me neither. And I’m not either.

Can you have a prejudice and not be a racist? You can reframe a prejudice and call it a preference. You can be biased for and biased against. I have read many a profile where the woman says flat out, I am not a racist, but I will not date outside race. I’ve met many white men who think Asian women are the bomb and black men who will not look twice at a black woman. These preferences may be borne of prejudicial lessons taught by our culture and society at large or closer to home. Are you (or l) bad for having these thoughts? For myself, I do not think we are bad, but we may be wrong.

I have spent my life being bombarded with images of what our culture (and 5th Avenue) considers the ideal woman. For over 50 years, I’ve flipped through the pages of magazines with page after page of beautiful models, who have had their near perfect images altered to appear even more flawless. Women are made to feel less than perfect and men are trained to seek a fantasy figure. For most of my life, the perfect woman was tall, lean and white, with full breasts and a round, but not too round, butt. Black women have rarely graced the cover of Vogue. We can identify the problem, but can we overcome it?

I cannot and I suspect many others cannot either. So again, does that make us bad? I don’t think so. I read a profile once in which the woman had just 3 qualifications for her potential match: he must bathe at least 4 times a week; must have teeth (not necessarily the ones he was born with); and he could not be married. How could I not be intrigued? So I wrote to her and told her I was leaps and bounds above that very low bar. I never heard back from her. Unrequited love.

#onlinedating #middleaged #manspov #middleageddating #lastfirstkiss

#daterequirements #firstdates

You can post a dozen pictures, spell out your life story, list your various characteristics, and message on the site for a few days with your potential match, but it doesn’t become real until one of you asks for a phone number. In the last post, I likened it to crossing a border, but are you crossing from East Berlin into the west or are you going the other way?

I have found over the last few months many women want the number exchange fairly quickly. From what I understand, men are just as bad, if not worse. Pretty much nobody wants a penpal. Meanwhile, I’m thinking, what’s so bad about being a penpal for a bit.

So why the need for the quick exchange? I think it signals several qualifiers. The first thing it shows is that you are on a dating site because you actually want to date. Seems sensible. Secondly, it stands to reason a person who is willing to give a number is single. Anyone who has cheated or been cheated upon knows how hard it is to keep up the charade when a text may come in at any inopportune moment. Third, it simply shows a strengthening interest in the other person. There really is no difference between texting and messaging within the PoF site. I get notifications when I get a message and I answer them like I do a text. And finally, you’re one step closer to talking on the phone. We exchange numbers ostensibly so we can continue texting each other, but we all know the phone call is just a day or two away.

I don’t really like giving my number very quickly and I think I’ve only asked once or twice. If I’m asked, I don’t think I’ve ever said abolutely not. And I’ve never given a fake number. There have been a few times when I’ve said slow down, what’s the rush, we’ve only just met. On the other hand, there have been a few times when I couldn’t be asked quickly enough. And when they asked if I’d like to talk, despite all my shy awkwardness, I hit that button and melted at the “hello”. What a delightful accent you have. I say something funny and she laughs. Oh, I like that.

#onlinedating #middleaged #manspov #middleageddating #lastfirstkiss

#nopenpals

A middle-aged man of decent height and build walks furtively beside the little shops lining the quiet street. It’s late, nearly midnight, and a cold rain falls steadily. He pulls his fedora brim further down his brow, cinches the belt on his trenchcoat tighter and buries his hands into the pockets. His right hand grasps the heavy pistol waiting there.

Occasionally, he steps into the doorway of a shop and looks back where he had been. Where had he been, he thought. 35 years of work and toil for a spy agency and a government that cared not at all for him. A long marriage broken to pieces. A post divorce relationship also left in tatters. He thinks about what lays ahead. He’s hoping for a new start, fresh beginnings. Maybe the woman waiting for him is the one and his long search will finally be over. He just needs to keep moving forward.

After a few more stops, he gets to the border crossing. He has his papers ready. He has talked to the guard several times. She is a bureaucrat with a rebellious streak. Beautiful, despite her drab uniform, she studies his papers, puts her hand out for his passport. She studies the picture, and asks, “What is your cellphone number, Mr. Strummer?”

Too late he realizes he has walked right into the trap. What to do? Shoot her, shoot himself, but those options seem kind of drastic. He edges his finger off the trigger of the hidden gun. He thinks he could just give her his number. Fuck it, he decides, and gives it to her, one slow digit at a time. She smiles and raises the gate. He’s crossing the border and there’s no turning back.

#onlinedating #middleaged #manspov #middleageddating #lastfirstkiss

#noir #datinginyour50s

i love the old rotary phones. That’s the kind of phone we had in the basement of my old house. I had to sneak down there because my father would invariably go into a rant when he discovered somebody was on the phone: “Who the hell is on the phone? Get off! I’m expecting a call.” My father never got calls, but our old rotary dial phone waited patiently in case he ever did.

Fear of my father’s wrath is probably the reason why I am not very good on the phone. Once I make a call, I’m quickly looking to end it. I am much better at texting and messaging through the PoF site. I was much better at note passing in grade and high school, rather than face to face talking. Invariably, I’d be left tongue-tied and crimson from embarrassment. If only romance consisted of nothing but the written word, I’d be a Romeo, a Lothario, a veritable Don Juan for the ages. Maybe not so much in the unscrupulous sense, but a serious seducer of women. Or not. I have been a one woman guy for most of my dating life.

Back to the old rotary dial phone, made of molded plastic and a handset attached to the body with a coiled, spring line that stretched for feet, so I could walk some of my anxiety away while talking. The best feature was the dial that you put the tip of your index finger into the hole of the corresponding number, swung the dial clockwise until it engaged, let go, and listened to it swing back. Seven digits put in and seven swing back. I never once dialed out of my area code while growing up. If I did it right, it could take minutes to dial a number. Letting go of the last digit and waiting for the girl’s phone to ring and be answered was the very definition nervous anticipation.

In many ways, online dating is perfect for me. I get to write to the woman for a while. If I could, I would let this go on for weeks. Let me discover you through words. Let me learn your politics, your religion, your hopes, dreams, disappointments. I want to know what movies you like and what music you played at 20 and if you still listen to it today. If you let me, I will discover those things that tickle you and turn you on. Given the chance, I will be your intimate friend before we ever say a spoken word to each other, much less meet. This pretty much never happens. Within a day or two of messaging, I tend to be asked, “Are we just going to be penpals or are we going to exchange numbers. And before you answer that, I don’t need a penpal.”

#onlinedating #middleaged #manspov #middleageddating #lastfirstkiss #givingyourcellnumber #telephonenumber

Hi Sarah. Please allow me to introduce myself. Except I’m not really introducing myself. I’m just giving you a bit of a poke. And I’m hoping you will then give my profile a bit of a gander, like what you see, and give me a poke back.

As I said, practically no woman was initiating contact with me. So I rolled through the “meet me” feature, looked at pictures, and read profiles. I sent a message to the ones I found attractive. I also sent messages to those I found super-attractive. And, oddly, I have sent messages to women who had no picture at all. More about these at a later date.

On PoF, one can use the “meet me” feature and click on the women you find attractive. The recipient of this positive acknowledgement sees you want to meet her and can send a message or not. In other words, on a site that has reduced dating to a series of swipes, this is the laziest way to meet a woman. It is literally a one icon press.

When I use the “meet me” feature, I scroll through the pictures of various potential dates, occasionally stopping to look further into the profiles. It always starts with the pictures though. If I like the pics, I will read the profile. If I like the pics and dislike the profile, I will probably still send a message. If I don’t like the pics, I likely won’t get to the profile. My message will usually consist of a greeting, a name if provided, and hopefully a humorous sentence showing I read her profile. Sometimes, I break my rules and just say, hello there.

Hey there and hello there:) are the second laziest ways to meet a woman. To my untrained ear, it even sounds a little creepy when I say it. When a woman says it, it sounds a little sexual. Sad to say, I use the phrase occasionally. And , as it happens, I get a boat load of “hey theres”. And while I dislike them, I don’t discard them out of hand. I take a look at the pics and maybe the profile. When I get them, my usual response to the ones I like is, “Hi there, ho there,” which are the lyrics to the Mickey Mouse club theme, but nobody ever remarks back to me they recognize it. One can only bring so much high culture into a place like this.

When I send a message to a woman I find attractive, I am hoping for a response, of course. There are several types of responses. As a paying member, I can see if the recipient has read my message or not and what she did with it. The most ego damaging response is when I see my message has been discarded unread. This means the woman has decided on the basis of my looks alone, she is not even going to waste the 30 seconds it would take to open the message and be charmed by my delightful opening lines. This is followed by the slightly less painful discarded read. At least I was given a chance, though found wanting.

Some of my messages are read, but never given a reply. Finally, some are read and I get a reply. Hallelujah! Some replies are, “Hi there!” which is just another way of saying, I’m going to give you one more chance to impress me, but you’re barely scraping by. I hate this response, because it really doesn’t carry the conversation forward and it puts all the weight on me. I saw a woman’s profile once in which her main pic was very stern looking. It really struck me this woman was not trying at all. Her tagline was, “Make me smile!” No thank you. You can just keep on frowning. I kind of feel the same way when I get a “hi there” response.

The best kind of response is the one where the lady read my message, it made her smile, and her response carries the conversation forward a bit. Don’t move too fast though. Don’t ask me for my phone number too quickly. I’m like a squirrel. I need a lot of skittering to and fro before I make any real moves.

Note: I’m told the “Hey theres” I get are actually the canned response when you hit the “flirt” option in “meet me”. Duh! I’m so gullible and those women are now officially in the top lazy classification.

H/t njgreeneyed

#onlinedating #middleaged #manspov #middleageddating #lastfirstkiss

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2018/08/08/health/online-dating-out-of-league-desirability-study/index.html

But wait! A new survey is out linked above that posits we are shooting quite a bit above our desirability index. Because the pain of rejection online does not compare to the pain of rejection IRL, we are much more willing to shoot high. I know I’m certainly guilty of this. I’m messaging lingerie models all the time (as it happens these are pics of actual lingerie models, but when they message back, it’s a scammer in Nigeria).

We are aiming 25% above our own desirability and we have a low rate of response, but an occasional response from a hotty is better than no response at all. According to the survey, Asian women and white men are the most desirable. It also says the younger the woman, the better. Men peak around 50, which means I may be a bit overripe.

One 30 year old woman had 1500 messages in one month. That’s approximately way the hell more than I get. I would’ve liked to have had more info on her. Presumably she’s attractive and approachable, but was she overtly sexual. How many messages got a response? Could she possibly keep a job?

The article also says writing novels to introduce yourself pretty much doesn’t work. Short and sweet works best. Personally, I try to indicate I read her profile and I try to be humorous. I feel if I can get you to smile, I may just open the door a crack. Some women require you write a certain amount of words. I admit this drives me a little nuts. I don’t want to write a term paper; I just want to say hello, take a look at me. If you like what you see, say hello back.

As for me, I’ll keep messaging the lingerie models. According to the survey I should only have a 10 to 20% successful response rate. My success rate is actually 100%, I’m waiting for the one that doesn’t respond. Maybe she’s the real one.

Hat tip to BlueMoon.

#onlinedating #middleaged #manspov #middleageddating #lastfirstkiss #desireabilityindex #onlinedatingsurvey

We have become spoiled with too many choices. I have Netflix, Hulu, Amazon prime, HBO, Showtime, Moviepass, and a Redbox membership. Damned if I can ever find a thing I want to watch. I have spent more time looking for something to watch than I did watching whatever I chose. Remember those days of our youth? We had 7 channels to choose from and the wacky stuff on UHF. And maybe there was one or two things that would hold your attention for a few hours, maybe Creature Feature or Abbott and Costello. And sometime during the night the network would stop telecasting. They’d put up a test pattern. I spent some time looking at that test pattern. We had limited choices and we made do and we were somehow satisfied.

The pool of eligible girls was limited too.  I had a graduating high school class of 300. If i do my math correctly, about half of those people were girls, so about 150. Except, I wasn’t a jock or one of the cool guys. Not all 150 were available. I was just your average sort of Joe. So of that 150, there may have been 30 who I kind of liked and I thought I might have a chance. Every so often I’d screw up my courage, go down to the basement to the only phone that had a little privacy in my crowded house. And I’d dial. I can still remember listening to the other phone ringing through the landline. Anxiety mounting, hoping she would answer, so I wouldn’t have to go through: “Hello,” a very masculine voice would finally pick up. “Hello. Mr. Lindstrom, is Sarah home,” I’d reply, a little light-headed. “Who’s calling?” Now I didn’t even have the element of surprise. I had to tell him my name. He would tell her and I could picture her waving her hands like the phone carried the plague. And yet, I chose Sarah. She was the girl for me. Limited as my choice was, I liked someone enough to go through the terror of calling.

I flick up the choices on my Netflix, flick, flick, flick, until I flick myself right to the bottom of the list, never finding anything I like. Hundreds of choices, thousands even when I go through the other services. How is that even possible? I go through the pics on PoF, flick, flick, flick. Woman after woman, no, no, no. Sometimes, I think, who the hell do you think you are? Making a split second decision on a woman who probably was trepidatious about putting herself out there. She goes through all her pictures and puts her best one up as her main profile pic. Maybe she’s just as nervous as I was calling the Lindstrom house. Maybe she imagines a guy swiping left. And he’s not even that good looking or appealing. And he is swiping left.

I have a pool of a thousand women. I don’t need a thousand women to choose from. It’s too many. How can I choose? What limits do i set upon myself? At first I put the age range from 35 to 65. I am 55. I can tell you, nobody in their 30’s is looking at me. I raised it to 45. At first I put in a distance limit of 10 miles, but I raised that as well. I prefer women without children or grown up. With the thought that everybody downplays their weight, I don’t tend to look at those who say they have a few extra pounds. “Thin” is thin, “average” may mean a few extra pounds, and “a few extra pounds” means fairly overweight. I’m okay with a few extra pounds. We are all of us getting older. There are wrinkles, sagging, less hair in some places, more in others (that’s God playing with us btw). With a pool of a thousand women, however, I find myself terribly picky, rejecting a fairly attractive woman for the flimsiest of reasons. Too short, pass. Too tall, pass. A little thick in the upper arms, pass. Good looking, but apparently unemployed, pass. I see some I like though. I’m attracted enough to send a little message. And the tables turn and I hear myself saying into that phone once more, “Hello, is Sarah home?”

I’m told the PoF veterans lie in wait for the newbies to pop onto their screens. The site even makes it easy if you’re a paying member with a pop up list of “new members in your area”. Picture the new prison bait walking between the rows of cells filled with snarling, catcalling reprobates, “Hey, new meat, c’mon over here. I got what you need. I have what you want.” The timid PoF newbie is buried beneath an avalanche of messages from eligible singles just dying to meet him. This, I’m told, happens.

This, however, was not my experience. I was greeted with a resounding yawn, a smattering of “so what”. I suspect the truly beautiful people have a much better go of it. Me? I was being weighed down with pictures that made me look like a wraith or John the Baptist ranting in the wilderness. Very few women were impressed with my good looks.

A few reluctantly read my profile and just a few of those contacted me. And those very few were the women you would expect raving Baptist John to attract. It became very apparent very quickly I was going to have to knock on some doors. Nobody was knocking mine down. So I looked at pictures, first the main one and , if I felt some attraction, I’d look at the rest. If I was still liking the woman, I’d read her profile. The profile rarely nullifies a great picture, but a great profile never overcomes an unattractive picture.

Most profiles have 4 or 5 pictures. Again, everybody puts their best face forward. Usually though, one of the pics is the real pic. The one that shows the equine nose or the tremendous butt. We all have flaws and we all have people who not only don’t mind the thing we’re most afraid to show, but actually are attracted to it. I started to message the ones I liked. And here’s what happened:

Oops. I have an appointment. I’ll get back to this tomorrow.

#onlinedating #middleaged #manspov #middleageddating #lastfirstkiss

So I’ve set up my profile, answered all the questions, posted a few demented pictures, and written a couple of paragraphs about myself. This is what I said:

Hello there. I’m a 55 year old man in the last few years of my career. Im a little closer to fit than average, but don’t go expecting 6 pack abs. That’s all I’m saying. I’m hoping to find someone to share what’s coming next, which hopefully is many more years of fun, excitement and discovery. I’m a little bit shy, so it might be best if you’re somewhat extroverted. And tall is good, too.

I work in a very male-dominated industry, very macho, but find that off-putting. I’d really like to find a good woman to balance out my work life. I do a lot of walking and hiking. Love, love, love the beach. I could easily stay on the beach from dawn to dusk. How much better it would be with an attractive, fun, and funny woman.

I do enjoy broadway, museums, concerts, music, reading and writing (not so much ‘rithmetic). Unlike the GoGos, I don’t have the beat, but I kinda wish I did. Shoot me a line, if any of this interests you. Thanks

So you made it to here. You deserve a joke: 2 brothers stole a calendar; unfortunately for them, they got caught. At sentencing, they each got 6 months!

What in God’s name was I trying to accomplish with those few sentences? I wanted to present myself as breezy and non-threatening, somewhat humorous and self-deprecating, while at the same time noting that I am employed, I do try to stay fit, and I can not dance. I later added the corny joke at the end to shore up my funny bonafides.

Little did I know that 99% of the people on this site hike, walk, and love the shore. One might as well write blah, blah, blah. It accomplishes the same thing. Kayaking and cycling are also big. Apparently everybody also loves sunsets, their children are their priority, and their friends always consider them charming. Nobody on here has been divorced through any fault of their own. Very few women are looking to just date and I haven’t seen a single one looking for a FWB situation.

Everyone on PoF has a great sense of humor that is sometimes sarcastic, but not in a mean way. Most women on here love professional sports to an extraordinary extent. I suspect they may be stretching the truth sometimes. I’m the opposite. I don’t have much use for sports, so saying the Rangers are Your team does nothing for me, but it must bring comfort to the average couch yam. I think what is really being conveyed is that she gets it, you want to watch some sports on Saturday and Sunday. It’s fine.

More people than not keep their political views to themselves. Those that do give an opinion usually tell 45 supporters to not bother. Occasionally, you’ll find a proud conservative. Very few people bring up God in their profiles. I avoid those that do religiously. Online daters seem to trend liberal and are casually religious.

Except for my pictures, which I didn’t realize were horrible, I was ready to step into the abyss and hit the “Meet me” button.

#onlinedating #middleaged #manspov #middleageddating #lastfirstkiss #badpics