Dr. Laura,
I was on E-Harmony for awhile. The sign up process made me nervous. I was very leery of this online stuff. Maybe I’m more like my Grandfather than I thought. (We gave him a new radio once for Christmas. He set it up on the refrigerator in a prominent spot, while continuing to play the old radio he had stashed behind it. Technology is not to be trusted.)
I took the multidimensional personality profile that E-Harmony boasts. Supposedly it will cut through the superfluous data and match me with highly compatible females who share my interests and values. I’m sure the profiles I saw represent nice people, but for the longest time it seemed the only matches E-Harmony sent me were 55-year old retired librarians who live in Missouri in a big house with 12 cats. I’ve got nothing against librarians or Missourians. But I live in Texas and I like dogs. They must have adjusted the algorithm slightly because I started getting matched with 48-year old women from Arkansas whose goal in life was to work for the ASPCA and rescue all the cats the librarians had yet to get to.
Getting to know someone in an online environment is challenging for anyone. It’s not easy being single. And even more challenging when you’re divorced. Add to that, I’m an older single person. All these together are daunting for anyone.
But nothing is ever easy for me. I’m "divorced, older, single guy with a plastic eye."
In the interest of full disclosure, how do you gently work that into an online instant message chat?
And if the relationship has potential, how do you sell that as an upside? "If you marry me, you can make faces when I’m driving and I’ll never know." Or, "I promise to only see half of any mistakes you might make." Or maybe, "Hey, just think! Our contact lens budget will be reduced by 25%!"
After going through the process you start to think the chances of meeting someone compatible are about the same as marrying the person who pulls up next to you at a red light (which, now that I think about it, might not be a bad idea). People have gotten engaged, married and had their first kid in the time it takes traffic lights in the town I live in to turn green.
Yet God is good. I met my wife on an online Christian dating site. We spent about 300 hours in phone conversations before meeting in person. If an average date is three hours, that's 100 dates at Starbuck's doing nothing but sitting at a table and talking. I don't know many couples who have done that. It's the work we put into it that makes it successful. I am blessed. She's fabulous in every way.
Whether dating in person or online, do your homework. Or as the carpenters say, "Measure twice, cut once."
Blessings to you-
Todd
