Today, my sister learned something I’ve known now for the past few months since I joined that famous Jewish dating site. First and foremost: the man of your dreams looks and acts nothing like you picture him to be. Secondly: she just joined a famous dating site purporting to match her on all those dimensions of personality. She may not realize it, but by the tone of her voice and the shock on her face, I know she’s going through the Five Stages of Online Dating (note to self: need more creative title for the 5 stages, suggestions welcomed below).
The First Stage is Excitement: Hey, I’ve been a member for a long time. Now, I’m a paying member! I can finally look at all the things on this dating site that have been denied a non-paying member.
The Second Stage is Curiosity: Wow, pictures! Ooo, and I can finally read the e-mails from people who are interested in me. Me? Little ole me? Oh, and I can e-mail these people too!
The Third Stage is Shock: Oh my gosh, these pictures! These people look nothing like I thought they would! What, you only e-mailed me one single word, “Hi.” What am I supposed to do with that?! Oh my gosh, I can’t believe that creep e-mailed me!
The Fourth Stage is Disappointment: Ugh, is there anyone useful on here?! What am I paying for? I keep seeing the same losers over and over again. Oh look there’s that cat loving mama’s boy…again! Hey dude in the Superman shirt, don’t you know the rules of online dating say no superhero profile pics and no pics where you cut off an ex-girlfriend. These rules apply to both men and women, you know! Could this stupid site be anymore useless!
(Note: Stage Three and Four can happen all at once. Each one together will develop more slowly or quickly depending on how addicted to profile searching you become.)
The Fifth and final stage is Acceptance: At some point, you want to give up, but decide there’s nothing else going on and you’ve gotten used to the people on the site so you might as well keep trying.
Yep, welcome, Little Sister, to the world of online dating. In order to proceed, I recommend a tremendous sense of humor laced with patience, liquor, if handy any other mild sedatives, and a willingness to submit yourself to an electronic devil that will drain your bank account in the promise of finding you your Perfect Match. It’s like facebook, only more evil. Oh, and I’m pretty sure the dude who claims to match you on all those dimensions of personality is really Satan.
No comments:
Post a Comment