I normally talk about the ups and downs of motherhood, but
today’s topic is going to be a little different. If you are happily married and
in it until the end, you are more than welcome to turn the channel because today’s
blog is about the perils of online dating.
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| My usual Friday night date |
I’ve been divorced for 3 years now, and I finally feel like
I have developed a sort of “new normal” with my kids. We have a few hiccups now and then, but I think we’ve settled
into a comfortable rhythm. Some of my friends agree and have been urging me to
get out and meet some new people…. meet some new men.
Yikes!!! I could live the rest of my life without having to deal with the dating scene again. This certainly classifies as a moment in time that I could forgo, omit, just plain do without.
I will be the first to admit that it has taken some time for
me to get over my divorce. The emotional healing was and is a brutal process
for me. Yet, that’s why my friends say I should start dating because “the best
way to get over one man is to start seeing another.” However, the dating
landscape has changed dramatically over the past few years. When I was in my twenties, I was going to
happy hour three days a week and to business “networking” events the other two.
Now that I am a mother of three, the happy hours have slowed down. Meeting guys
isn’t as easy as it used to be. Where I am going to meet them... at the
McDonald’s play area? The closest I've gotten to a cougar experience is a trip to the zoo with my kids. Hence, the emergence of online dating sites. But I’m not
totally convinced that online is the place for me to find love either.
First of all, I’m just opposed
to paying for the services? I can't really explain why, but it just seems wrong. What am I paying for…the chance to read your
profile and send you an email? I know it’s the way things are done nowadays,
but I don’t see the value in it. The little that I have done hasn’t produced
anything worth talking about. The guys are either older, younger, slimmer,
heavier or broker than their profile indicated. If I meet you out on a date and
you don’t look like your profile picture, you should buy drinks until you do.
I’m not looking for perfection, but I’m honest, and I expect other people to be
as well. Is that naïve of me?
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| My idea of a threesome. Hanging out with the girls. |
My friends say you have to go
through a lot of frogs to get to your Prince Charming. The problem is that I
don’t have that kind of time. I have three kids, and we are all very active in
our extracurricular activities. It
doesn’t leave much room for surfing the web for a date. Besides, I don’t want
my children to see me parading around with a bunch of “frogs” and thinking this
is the way it should be done. Now that I am a mom, I have to think about how my
children perceive what they see. I don’t want to give them the impression that
dating is about quantity and not quality.
I guess I’m old fashioned. I
want to meet someone out at a party or event, or have my friends hook me up
with someone they know and trust. I know that finding a relationship takes an
investment and a certain of amount of risk. But I’m not in my twenties any more
and just like with my 401K, I feel like I should be a little more conservative
with the resources of my time and heart.
Will the absence of online
dating make it harder for me to get a second chance at love? Probably. But that
is a risk I’m willing to take.
What do you think about online
dating? Let me know.
