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Online Dating Experience 18
Filtering Dating Matches
45 year
old female from Texas
I've been a member of an online dating
service for about a year. In the beginning, as I was
fresh chum thrown into shark-infested waters, I was flooded
with emails. Talk about email management problems!
After a while, things settled down and many of the
men fell off in their pursuit, for whatever reasons.
At first, I had a whole consideration process for
the profiles, and it was very fair and gave everyone
a chance and blah blah blah. Didn't work. Too time
consuming and led me to dumping a whole bunch of time
into online conversations with men online that were
never going to work out offline. My consideration process
now is this: Look at their primary photo. Assume it
is their best photo, since they chose it to be primary.
No photo? Reject profile. Now, looking at the photo,
consider this. If you go out with this man more than
once, at some point he will expect you to kiss him.
Is this a man you would want to kiss? If the answer
is no, reject profile. If the answer is yes or maybe,
go to next consideration. Is he looking to date women
from age 18 to 99? Playa. Reject profile. Much too
young or much too old? Reject profile. Child status
okay with you, whether childless, wants, doesn't want,
has? No? Better reject profile. Check height and geography.
Reject if necessary. If, at this point, the man and
his profile are still under consideration, I look at
what he writes. I bear in mind that writing is not
everyone's forte. I just look to see if there are any
big red flags, and if he has something interesting
to say.
First meetings....I tend to meet men who (1) pass
my filter process above, (2) have an intelligence level
at least approximating my own, (3) a good sense of
humor, and (4) nice manners. I set off for the first
meeting with the intention of having some good conversation
and an enjoyable evening, and I am rarely disappointed.
Most of the time I don't want to see the man again
in a dating situation, but many of the men I've met
remain friends. Some of them I've gone on to date for
a good length of time. There've been a few I wanted
to see again but that did not want to see me again.
In those cases, I'm a little disappointed, but I just
recognize that I am not The Person for everyone, and
respect their decision.
For me, online dating is supplemental to "offline" dating.
Online, I meet some men I would never meet offline,
and vice versa. I like that both give me access to
different men, and it increases the odds I will meet
the right man for me. Each experience I have, be it
positive or negative, I use to develop myself as a
person and to better prepare myself for the next date.
Dating is difficult, no matter if you are getting
dates online or in person. But what other (acceptable)
choice do we have?
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