One More Try

I recently decided to give the internet dating world another shot. I am not sure if I will regret it or not but figured it is worth another try.

"Why are you still single?"

This is a question I am asked a lot as I am sure a million other singles are asked. I also get, "Why would he let you go?" with a quizzical raise of the eyebrow as if someone letting go of me implies there is a true deficit to my character.

I am usually puzzled as to how to answer these questions with real honesty.

Why am I still single? Because I fall in love with the wrong men and sometimes too easily. Because I was either too picky or not picky enough. Because I want what every other single person wants-the person I am with to compliment my life. Because I need time, a man's time, not all of it-some of it. Because I am not out in the world enough while I spend forty hours a week working a job where I meet few people who are not mentally ill and under my care. Because I won't settle for a married man or a man who wants me for casual sex. Because I am not perfect. Because, because, because. It could go on forever but I'll stop there because I don't want it to.

Why did he let me go? Not sure about that one really. Because I wasn't what he wanted and therefore, I let him go. To elaborate on that cannot be done in the first conversation. Well, it actually can be but that is too much to disclose and seems too sad a discussion for first dates. I get upset about these questions yet they are the same ones I want to ask of him too on the first date.

I wish we could just have those questions to fill out on our profile questionnaire. It might be easier to weed through the truth rather than lies. But at the same time, our answers could be lies just the same. I would love to hear the real parts first, the good and the bad instead of the colorful things we say to impress each other and draw each other in.

I find it amazing that I look through profiles and dismiss men as easily as they look at mine and dismiss me. I look at photographs and think, Hmmm…is that what he really looks like? To be honest, no one really looks like their photo. Even movie stars and fashion models don't look like their pictures. You can't hear how someone laughs in a photo or if their nose crinkles when they are amused. However much photos are to capture us-they don't. They capture an image of the second it takes to click the button. They are not photos of who we really are.

We can't tell about ourselves or learn about another in the few words allowed. In filling out profiles we aren't allowed to write a memoir or even the highlights of our life because there is not enough room to explain it all. And then, we judge and are judged if what we do write is too long or too short. It is all a crap shoot and a twisted roll of the dice decides if destiny steps in.

Yet…I am still stepping out in the midst of this lunacy again. Why? Because I am single and I don't want to answer that question for the rest of my life. I would much rather be asked this one: How did the two of you meet?

Monika M. Basile