mercredi, mai 02, 2012

I'll be your fantasy...not

Friends (mostly those who have never experienced the horrors of middle-aged Internet dating), have been trying to persuade me that I am too much of a cynic, a pessimist, and a fool for not believing in the possibility that love will find me.

Quietly, I put my profile back online -- more as an experiment, than with anything hopeful in mind.

I am convinced that a lot of single or divorced folks my age are broken, bruised and bent by prior romantic disappointments.

If they recognize how messed up they are, and how many mistakes we've made, as I do -- perhaps they have a chance of creating something lasting. If they don't, they simply spin on the wheel of endless intoxication and subsequent disappointments.

Then there is the fantasy factor provided by the Internet. It can seduce even those of us who know that they know better.

Today I received an email from a potential beau. We'd already chatted a few times. As is usual with me, I tried to be positive, and to be gentle when I told him that I didn't think it would work between us. Distance was only one of many factors.

Written in Italian, the email told me that I was the only one he wanted to know. Then he gave me his phone number.

I doubt he wants to know me anymore. Though I tried to soften my response, I told him that the person he saw online was a fantasy --morever, if I had to guess, a fantasy that he'd added to and recreated for his own purposes.

I encouraged him to seek women closer to his geographical area -- and to surrender his fantasies about me.

Of course, I have no control over what he thinks or doesn't think. And I have no idea whether he will take my advice -- that's up to him. 

I don't do the moony fantasy romantic thing. Having it pop up in my inbox is a little disconcerting, to say the least.

Sometimes I wish I was a little softer. Then I think about the trouble I'd be in right now.

Adjusting the quills, I walk back into combat. I mean, back in online conversations -- just a little harsher and suspicious than I was before.

Some call it wisdom.














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