Spelling Bee

Having been the winner of several spelling bees as a child and even competing in a regional competition (I tanked on the word "doughboy") I am particularly anal about spelling. Consequently, poor spelling and grammar has become a specific turn off for me. Does this make me super elitist?!?! I don't know, but I can't seem to help the fact that it bothers me so much. However, I realized recently what a unique problem this is. For example, when dating someone whom you have met in the non-online dating world you could go weeks, even MONTHS without knowing the level of their spelling prowess. But in the online dating world you know pretty much immediately. From your profile page to the first exchange of e-mails or texts, you pretty much have to lay all your spelling cards on the table from jump. It gets tricky because a good speller does not necessarily an intellectual make. I have met plenty of geniuses who are horrible at spelling. So why is it so hard for me to let go of such a superficial judgment?! I have a few theories on the subject.

To start off, dating online is very much like accepting applicants for a job. Profile pages are like resumes, photos are like head shots at an audition. And after spending my whole entire day in front of a computer, the last thing I want to do when I get home is spend hours and hours scanning my PC screen. I want the process to be quick so I scan (more like skim) for key phrases, important facts and try to synthesize and process all the data coming at me as fast as possible to make a decision on a person. There just isn't a lot of time to mess around! So if you only have 2.5 minutes to impress me with your profile page, the least you could do for me is run a spell check!

Moreover, when profiles do not have a lot of information, us online daters are forced to "read between the lines" if you will. I find myself looking a little closer at pictures, reading answers and phrases over again trying to piece together the big mystery that the guy has left me to solve. So I often use things like not having read any books lately, typing in all caps or even typing in "cell phone text script" to help me make my decision. Hey don't judge me! I'm not the one with a bare bones profile page!

A few months ago I started exchanging text messages with a guy I met online. However, with each text message he sent me I became not only more turned off but also extremely confused!!! What was so strange was that his profile made perfect sense, grammar and everything. Something didn't seem to be adding up. So I decided to ask my friend for advice. She is always so great at reminding me to be gracious and to give guys more of a fighting chance. And she said something to me that I hadn't thought of before: "You never know, he could have a learning disability." So reluctantly I decided to keep talking to him and it turned out she was right! Although nothing really came of my conversations with this guy romantically, I was really grateful to have a friend push me towards grace and not allow me sit on my judgy, spelling bee pedestal.

Since that time I can't honestly say that I don't take spelling into account when assessing a potential online match, but I think (I hope) I am way more gracious about it.

Grateful for spell check,
ODQ

Is eHarmony eHarming Me?

I realize lately that I have to be super aware of how I peruse my matches on eHarmony. Since I don't have to interact with a person in the immediate sense, its very easy to fall into either objectification or insensitivity. I end up thinking and often times even saying things out loud about these guys to my friends that I wouldn't normally say if it was a person that we actually knew. At least if I knew them, I would have been a whole lot more kinder or PC about it. Is that fake? Two faced? I don't know. But the point is I need to treat my matches with the same respect that I would treat anyone that I met in person, whether or not they can hear what I'm saying. Overall, I, and I think the rest of the online daters need to remember that sifting through your matches is not like shopping for fruit at a grocery store, where you may very nonchalantly cast off or pick up the ones that look the best. Its more like searching for diamonds among barrel full of other precious gems.

Best,
ODQ

To Close or Not to Close the Match

This week I debated for a while about closing communication with a match on eHarmony. I am trying to be "open" I keep reminding myself. Well, I was only mildly attracted to him and his profile answers were not that unique. It was the typical stuff (not bad stuff): loves God, hanging out with friends, values family. He seemed like he was a likable person, but I wasn't sure the chemistry was going to be there, especially because it seemed like he might not be very funny (believe me when I tell you that it pains me how much of a deal breaker this is for me).

This guy is not very quick to respond to communication so I had thought he might have just decided to pass after seeing my answers to his first set of questions. So I was surprised when I found out a couple days ago that he had moved to the next level of communication: Sending "must haves" and "can't stands." This is the level of communication where you send the person a list of things that you must have in a partner and things you cannot stand to have in a partner. Pretty self explanatory right? Of course one of my must haves is sense of humor. Looking back on the situation I realize that I really was looking for him to say something, anything that would give me a legitimate reason to close the match. So when I received his "must haves" and "cant stands" I immediatly latched onto one of his "cant stands" that I had an issue with and closed the match. Judge me if you must but I did it. I didn't stop to think that this guy might not just be going though the motions of eHarmony communication and might actually be genuinly intrested in me. So I was even more surprised when he decided to send me a message after I closed the match (you can send one final farethewell message on eharmony before a match is fully closed). In his message he said that he thought if we met in person I would feel differently, to which I had to respect. And so I decided to take my own ODQ advice: I sent him a message back and agreed to meet with him one on one.

Maybe I made the decision to close the match prematurely. My instincs are usually spot on but I'm open to being wrong. Let you know how it goes :)

Open,
ODQ

Fade to Frienship

It's the age old When Harry Met Sally question: Can a man and a woman have a relationship/friendship without sex getting in the way? And in the online dating world post-dating friendship can be a little tricky. I'm not even sure how often it even happens successfully. As for myself and a few of the women that I know who have tried online dating, the odds for maintaining a friendship with someone you have gone on a few dates with are currently zero times out of 10. It just doesn't happen. More often than not us online daters have opted for what I like to call the "fade out." The fade out is the process of phasing out communication with a person that you have been on one or a couple dates with but are not really interested it seeing long term. Its been a difficult question for me to deal with because there are so many factors involved. I mean first off, do I even want to have a friendship with this person? Secondly, how do we make that awkward transition from something that started off heading in a completely different direction? Do I just subtly stop letting them pay for my meals anymore? Opening doors?

Well, recently I became really quite sad over the fact that I might be losing out on a great friendship with a guy I had gone on a couple dates. Both dates were fantastic! A lot to talk about, a lot of joking, fun etc. During the second date we both realize that there was something we fundamentally disagreed upon that would prevent the relationship from going any further romantically. And yet, I still felt a connection that I didn't want to lose just because we decided not to date. After that revealing date it honestly seemed like we were both going to play the "fade out" game. I don't think either one of us knew how to continue building a friendship and change the direction of the way we had started our relationship. Well, I decided to take action. I just thought, "how sad would it be if I go on dates with all these guys and not one of them turns into a friendship?!" In the non-online dating world this happens all the time! And I didn't want to lose this guy as a friend. So after two weeks of "fading" I sent him a text asking, "Do you think it's possible for a man and a woman who have decided not to date to be friends?" There was way more in the text than that but you get the idea. And guess what! He responded so positively, saying that he definitely wanted to continue a friendship with me. I was elated. We are now currently building a very fun and healthy friendship, which I hope will deepen over time.

Now I know not every situation is prime for a post dating friendship. But I had a feeling with this one. So you'll have to decide for yourself whether or not you A) want to be friends with that person long term and B) Its appropriate for you to ask for friendship given your dating experience with them. My recommendation is to never use the "let's be friends" line unless you absolutely mean it. Besides, people can tell when you mean it and when you don't anyway.

We'll have to see where this friendship goes but for now I'm so grateful to have actually gained a relationship out of my dating experience, even if it isn't a romantic one.

Friends Forever,
ODQ

Change on the Inside

I don't really know how to go about explaining the change that I have noticed in myself recently. But I'm going to try:

As a Christian woman, being in the online dating world for me has been a process of spiritual discovery and growing in relationship with God. I have had to trust him to change my perspective of myself, first breaking the lie that somehow I am "too good" or "too pretty" or "too amazing of a woman" to have to resort to dating online. Moreover, I have had to give up the perception that dating online is a "last" resort(even if the rest of the world doesn't). The truth is that since I have started going on dates with guys that I have met online, I have been on just as many dates with men that I have met in person. Because of this I started wondering is there a connection here. I think the connection is this: As I have allowed God to move and shift my heart in the online dating game, these changes have affected my life in the off-online dating game. And honestly speaking, this observable change is enough for me to recommend online dating to any woman, especially if she is submitted to letting God change her through it.

PTL,
ODQ

How's Your Luck Been On this Site?

One of these days I plan on writing about something that I actually LIKE about online dating! Really!!! It's not all bad! But today is not that day:

I was matched with a guy on eHarmony recently who immediately sent me an e-mail message. For those of you unfamiliar with the eHarmony world, when you are matched up with someone you have three options. A) You can simply close the match. B) You can respond using a series of somewhat open ended questions. You can create your own or select ones that have been written out. They are things like, "where do you see yourself in 15" or "would you describe yourself as an affectionate person?" Harmless right?! There are even answers to choose from along with a blank space so the person can write in their own answer. (Side note, I almost always write in my own answer to give myself an edge. It shows I don't fit into a box or say...a multiple choice question). But the holy grail of hoped for options (in my experience) is a personal e-harmony mail where you can bypass all the other communication steps and get right to the nitty gritty. I love this option because I've become pretty impatient with pat answers and trite responses to my carefully crafted questions.

Well, a few days ago I received my favorite type of communication from a guy who is on his way to getting his law degree from UCLA... Nice, right! We exchange numbers through eHarmony mail and he called me today. We spent the few minutes on the phone with the typical chit chat and mild banter. And then he asked me a stomach turner: So have you had any luck on this site so far? I say, "well sort of, I guess, I mean, well, uh I mean I talked to a couple guys but it didn't really..uh" He says, "What did they just stop calling you back or something?" Immediately I start thinking, "Why the HECK are we having THIS conversation over the PHONE????!!!!!!" And what's more ridiculous is that this is not the first time I have been asked this question. If you haven't noticed by now, I am a HUGE fan of lists. It's sad that I even have to spell it out, but here are all the reasons why I am NOT okay with this line of questioning, especially on the first phone call:

1) Asking about someone's luck on eHarmony or any other dating site is not like asking about where you grew up. It's asking about someone's dating history.
2) It's none of your business, until I trust you enough to talk about this part of my life.
3) Why do you need to know? Clearly, I'm still looking, otherwise WE would not be talking in the first place. If I had had "luck" on the site (meaning I found a guy I'm interested in), what am I doing talking to other guys?
4) It puts pressure on the person to ask the question back so that you can share about your past experiences with dating on the site. And you have no idea how much a girl loves to hear about the other women you have dated through the site even before you go out on your first date with her! Awesome! (note the sarcasm here, please)
5) It makes it sound like you have nothing else better to say.
6) There should be an unwritten rule for online daters to spend as little time talking about online dating with each other as possible.

So there you go. Hopefully the world can benefit from this list and I will stop getting this question from people.

Semi-Lucky,
ODQ

Learning to Love the Gray Area

More and more I am learning to to LOVE living in the gray areas, primarly because I have gone on a couple dates with guys who have NO IDEA how to live there. By gray area I mean that place where things are undefined, decisions haven't been made, commitments are not yet expressed... not to mention the fact that (ahem) this was only a FIRST DATE! However, I am learning to see the signs ahead of time. Here are some of the signs that a potential online dater does not know how to live in the grey area (in no particular order):

1) Before the first meet up s/he sends you texts messages frequently throughout the day with chit chatty questions like, "How is your day going," or, "what are you up to?"
2) In his/her conversations/text messages s/he uses the word "love" a lot ie "ok love," "goodbye my love" or "man you love me!"
3) The potential dater uses committed phrases like, "I'm gonna make you mine," "you're mine," or "I got you." Remember, this is only cute/funny if you're SURE the other person is joking and there's no way to tell that until you meet a person.
4) The potential dater calls you pet names such as babe, baby, sweetheat, sweetie pie, honey etc. You get the picture. Basically any term of endearment should be reserved for those to whom you are sure you want to endear yourself to. Make sense?

Disclaimer: Just because your potential dater exhibits one of these signs does not necessarily mean that they are incapable of living in the gray area. You will have to use your own best judgement in each scenario.

Happily gray,
ODQ