So, I came to a decision. It wasn’t an easy one, but this time I decided to do it. I wouldn’t joke about it, I wouldn’t shrug my shoulders even once, I wouldn’t lie about it, and I would just get off my ass and do it. It was time. I’m fifty-seven and it’s not the biological clock that is ticking but the clock that says you want to find someone before it’s too late period.
But how do you do it in LA? Everyone complains about how hard it is to meet people here. People sit in their cars, they eat in their cars, they put on their makeup in their cars, they have sex in the their cars, well, to put it another way, they do everything in their cars. However, cars are not viable social mediums – nor are movie theaters, nor are supermarkets (all rom-coms to the contrary), nor anywhere else in this city. And if you’re my age, you don’t really go to clubs with twenty somethings hoping to even meet any guys even in their forties.
So, sadly, it was the other thing, online, the Internet, the World Wide Web, this was to be the only outlet, especially for someone who was intrinsically shy and always had problems breaking the ice. Now, mind you, I’ve tried all of this before, I’ve been on Perfect Match, I’ve been on Jdate, I’ve been on Match, I’ve been on Eharmony, but I’m being very honest, I really didn’t want to change my life enough to take any of it seriously. I’d let guys contact me, I’d hesitate, I’d evade, I’d not give out my number, I’d email them to death, and mostly nothing much would happen. So I had the illusion of doing something while doing nothing.
Well, that wasn’t my goal this time. I wanted the support of a genuine male, I wanted to touch one, hear one, see one, smell one, jump all over one…in short, I desperately needed testosterone in my life.
So, at the recommendation of a close friend, I tried PlentyOfFish.com. It is a free site, he told me, and his ex-girlfriend found her new boyfriend on this site. Well, he’s serial monogamist with all his bases covered in the web realm and his advice was definitely solid gold. I figured why not just get on a free site with no follow-through then pay for a site with no follow-through.
With such optimism, I soldiered on. I filled out the profile. Oh, and on POF (as the aficionados call it) there isn’t much to fill out. Which was probably best, as I had somewhat recently spent at least 45 minutes filling out the 29 dimensions of compatibility with Eharmony, and none of those questions asked you about physical attributes. The thing to know about me is that I’m shallow. I’m not attracted to bald, short Nobel Prize winners, I’m just not. There is probably an entire constellation of women in this world who are, but I’m not one of them. Also, I am interested in men who attract me on a physical level. For me, if it’s not happening there, it probably won’t happen period. You’re all saying to yourselves, that’s why she’s not with someone or married at her age, and you may be right, but it’s not something I can seem to change.
Also, it was important to me that I find someone roughly in my age group. I wanted someone who could relate somewhat to the same things I did. I wanted someone who could remember the Kennedy Assassination or the advent of the Beatles, and remembered what the sexual revolution of the 60’s and the disco era of the 70’s was about. At least, they could remember the shame -- not of the sexual revolution but disco….
So with these few requirements, I filled out the questionnaire. I said yes to the fact that I had a car, though I wonder why…possibly for the sex that I mentioned before. I said I was looking for a long-term relationship (LTR in internet lingo), they ask for your age, height, your body type, and for you to make some sort of short statement about yourself. (May I say right here and now that the following I know to be true: men lie about their age and height and women lie about their age and weight.) More important than even this brief rigmarole that no one was going to read were the photos. You have to think about the impression you are making, especially since POF doesn’t seem to really edit the photos unless someone complains about someone taking a shot of their own penis for their profile pic.
I chose my photos carefully. I was quite positive I wanted to create a certain impression. I wanted everyone to see how young I looked. (Oh, again, everyone says how they don’t look their age. It’s rather sad when you think about it in our youth-oriented world. People seem to think there is something shameful about not having died before they got old, as the Who wanted us to do. So, therefore, I have said in my profiles that I don’t look my age. Who wants to swim upstream?) There is a full body shot, me in all my nicely worked out glory. There is a close up with me in a low cut blouse so everyone can inspect my boobs. There is an old author photo of me, since my friend Judy has told me that author photos are forever, and another one of me fully –clothed clutching a wrap-sweater, and looking seriously, might I add, even soulfully at the camera. Ilana in all her moods.
So, I said to myself and the four winds, WTF (more internet lingo that I don’t feel like translating), and I posted that comprehensive and complicated look into my soul and sent it into the ether, the void or perhaps, just perhaps, to love.
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