Sitting in front of a computer screen at any time of the day or night wearing a bathrobe and slippers, anything else comfortable or even nothing at all, with a cup of coffee looking at hundreds or thousands of pictures and profiles of supposedly available people looking for love or sometimes something like love, just like you are, has to be a single person’s definition of paradise. It’s a new phenomenon and it’s growing fast in popularity, respectability, and curiosity.  At first glance it seems like the perfect venue for ending the search, making the final connection and finding that one of our dreams.  That’s at first glance.

For those who linger online for a while it requires only a few more glances to realize that it’s not all that easy and that finding the right one, no matter how many choices there seem to be, is daunting, frustrating and often seems just not possible. It’s like a very big bumper car ride with personalities, possibilities and projections all colliding and then moving on to look for another prospect. It’s a huge arena for all the games people play and even the most sincere intentions can get lost in this marketplace of seeking the most and best with what one has to offer.

Good things can happen.  Apparently 20% of all romantic connections nowadays are made online. But no one can how many of the people online connect or don’t connect and that’s a whole different story.  Given the experiences, hopes and wants that converge on this great catalogue of people it’s more like two heavily loaded freight trains crashing headlong into each other and expecting to fall in love than a ferry ride to Tiburon. It’s sitting at some well-lit place eating or drinking while under the microscope of each other’s critical scrutiny  trying to fit or be fitted into each other’s preconceived idea of right, perfect or desired, a preconception that has been hanging around solidly for a long time and doesn’t want to change or be changed.

There are three parts to meeting online. First there is the written where illusions begin. Second is the spoken where everything can die in a single mispronounced syllable or move to the up close and personal third part.  And that’s where everything happens or doesn’t happen and we realize again and again that disappointment is indeed a bitter herb in a banquet of feelings.

There is no quitting in romance; there’s no alternative to searching. And what provides a bigger field than the internet? It’s addictive. It’s needed. It’s hope. If we do quit, where do we go?  What do we do? We think maybe one more letter, maybe today, maybe someone overlooked the first time, maybe anything. It’s like The Hotel California. We can always check in but we can never check out, unless we find that illusive “right one.”  So we keep trying, but while we are trying one thing is absolutely certain, can be counted on without question, is a given.  We will have failures, mismatches, go-no-where encounters, and a whole lot of disasters.

I believe that most of the people who crumble in the face of all these pressures are under other circumstances perfectly normal, acceptable and admirable people.  But with no accountability, no cousin or pal to answer to or complain to, propriety, civility and decorum seem to slip away at the edge of potential, potential everything or nothing. I feel quite certain that I have been someone’s nutty date and yet no one I know and trust would think of me as anything but quite together, charming and wonderful. But I have crumbled and without even knowing why or being able to stop the crash.

After a while we could become quite despondent over the situation; we could cry or even become depressed over the mishaps inherent in meeting strangers with the intent of fulfilling all one’s aspirations for true love, companionship or something of substance. We could. 

Or as Joan Rivers puts it, if we laugh at what scares us most, it won’t scare us so much. I hated blind dates when I was in high school or college.  Some fraternity buddy always had some friend from another college who was in town for the weekend and needed a date and that friend inevitably turned out to be the guy who couldn’t get a date at his own school. Those were long nights and tried the best of friendships. I never met anyone in my whole life who loved blind dates. It wasn’t very funny to young sensitive people. It wasn’t funny to me, then. But years later the stories of some of those long nights became great material for humor. Tell an awful blind date story, everyone laughs and tries to tell a worse one. It’s like telling about a perfect wedding or vacation; no one cares.  But tell about one where everything went wrong and everyone listens.

Online dating is a crazy world but if given the right attention and slant, it’s funny as hell.  As I started recounting my stories, people laughed and wanted more. I never went on a single date looking for a bad time, but when it happened, I remembered enough to tell about it and it always got a laugh, a request for more, and the offering of a worse story. Online dating is a long stream of blind dates with a slim chance of being a hit.  If we don’t laugh about it, we’re doomed.  It’s better to laugh.  Someone said it.  Romance makes fools of us all.                                                      
           

We face all that because being alone is not fun.  It isn’t for me, anyway, and probably isn’t for most other people.  Why else would there be millions of people signed on to dozens of online dating sites?