The New Geography of Dating

I guess I’ve decided to take my first stab at dating here in Austin. At some point during the past 6 months or so I must have re-upped my Match.com profile for 3 months and then forgot about it and let it re-up again for 3 more months. While I was still in Virginia I didn’t see much point in checking it as I knew I was going to be leaving, but since I’ve still got another month to run out on it, I figured I’d give it a whirl.

I’m no stranger to Match, I’ve used it previously with mixed results. I’m incredibly picky when it comes to these things though so the people I contact are few and far between. If someone happens to contact me, either through a message or a “wink” that tends to smooth things over though. Last weekend a cute Asian girl, a few years younger than me, winked at me. Last night I decided to reply to her wink with a message. We’ll see where things go from there.

If anything, I’ve become more pragmatic when it comes to dating over the last few years. I know what I do and don’t want in a person and in a relationship. My only problem tends to be that when I find someone who meets my criteria, I don’t meet theirs. I have to admit that I’ve often chalked my lack of success to geography, or rather the type of people I met in my previous geographic location. I’m hoping that a new latitude and a city like Austin will find me people more my own speed and ideally women who meets my standards while I meet theirs.

Conflicted

I swear I’m nothing if not a tragic figure and like all tragic figures I create my own misery. The last several months of work have been hell and while I love my career, I think I may have finally hit the wall at my current job. For nearly 3 years I was willing to deal with the bullshit, with the sub-standard tools, the office politics, the lack of communication, and the talent-lacking old guard constantly being put into decisions where they could make poor decisions affecting numerous people’s jobs. Last summer I said I’d give the company another year to turn itself around and over the last nine months I really thought things were, only to have an almost total reversal over the past couple of months as we gear up for something new. I don’t look forward to going to work anymore and it’s taken its toll both mentally and physically on me recently. In almost everything else I’ve done in life I’ve been able to say “well I tried and I wasn’t very good, so I’m done” but not in this. My current career is the one thing that even when it beat me down, I came crawling back. Where I’m at right now isn’t a situation where I’m doubtful about my career choice, but more a case of realizing that I’m not getting all that I should be out of my career right now.

I might have been able to hang on a bit longer, that is until I found out about at least one (perhaps 2 or 3) people I know who are thinking about leaving as well. And that got me to thinking Saturday night, which was when I more or less decided that I was going to start getting my resume in order and start looking for new jobs. The difficulty with what I do is that the jobs are so scattered around the country. You see, I’m a game developer and while there are a concentration of studios throughout California, in Texas, and Seattle, those aren’t places I’m living in right now and although I’m no stranger to moving for work, there comes a point where you want to set down roots and I’m wondering when that’s going to be for me, I’m wondering whether I’m hurting myself by leaving.

I’m fairly certain the real answer to that is that I’m not, especially given the uncertainty of the track that my current employer has chosen (in my view at least) and the fact that some of the people thinking about leaving are my few friends here, but there are other friends I’ve made here who I will be sad to leave. And while I really have never liked living in this area of the country, I’m not certain that wherever I end up will be any better. Yet I’m still considering leaving as it’s the logical choice, but due to the aforementioned penchant for tragedy, I’ve made a move that may complicate my life.

Someone got in touch with me on Ok Cupid recently and I’ve just responded to them. Now here’s the thing. There’s nothing wrong with getting involved with someone when you’re not 100% sure you’re sticking around so long as you’re honest with them before thing become too serious. I’ve been in this situation before and what it really comes down to is that you can’t put your life on hold for every little thing, because you honestly never know how it’s going to turn out. Before I moved down here I got involved with someone for a couple months before I found this job and left, but I was very honest with this person the entire time and things worked out for the best. Now in general it’s more accurate to expect that nothing is going to evolve between myself and this person who I’ve messaged, but the sheer fact that I’m thinking about leaving, coupled with my tragic persona means that this is probably going to work out this time.

The sad truth however (and the one thing I expect to remain true and un-tragic, regardless) is that I’ve never met anyone in my life who is so amazing that I would consider sacrificing my career goals and professional happiness for. When it really comes down to it, my job has more of a chance of sustaining my happiness in the long term. I don’t know, perhaps it’s my lot to walk down the tragic road, because as a matter of fact I have plenty of friends who have been stuck with similar dillemas. Maybe it’s the hallmark of the sensitive guys of my generation to seek this kind of tragedy. If anything it has something to do with all those second generation emo records we listening to in the 90’s … back when the genre was still about hardcore music with feelings and not this watered down crap they play today. But I digress. What it all comes down to is that I’m conflicted. I’m not even really in a horribly conflicting situation yet, but regardless, moving on is never easy and maybe it’s just self-sabotage that I’m putting myself in a potentially tragic relationship. Maybe this is how I deal with change. Or maybe this is just the way I’m written.

How Not to Succeed at Love

I’m listening to Tom Waits at the moment while several windows from Match.com line the tab bar at the top of my browser. I figure if I’m going to be unsucessful romantically the very least I can do (aside from the usual self-loathing and complaining) is share my experience with the world. Maybe someone will learn something from my experience; maybe that someone will be me. In either case I’ve got nothing to do right now and Mr. Waits doesn’t seem to think it’s such a bad idea so we’ll see how this goes.

I have my Match.com searches saved into 3 categories at the moment: blondes, brunettes, and redheads. Now at first glance one might take me for a superficial womanizer, organizing search parameters that might allow him to better narrow down his flavor of the week choice of female companion. This couldn’t be further from the truth. With me it’s more about science. Anyone who’s ever done a search at Match.com or any other dating site of comparable size will understand as I do that if you live in a reasonable populated area and unless you become extremely specific, any search you make will likely come up with 100+ profiles. On the one hand this is great because dating for pragmatic indivuals such as myself, we realize that there is no such thing as true love and that for every person you’ve ever fallen madly in love with, there are likely hundreds of others who would just as easily fit the bill all over the world. On the other hand, with such a selection you really want to find the people who most match you, such as to increase your overall odds of any given dating situation resolving itself amicably. See? It’s science.

So rather than put in what ultimately ends up being a fairly standard search (mostly because these sites offer only the most generalized criteria in order to appeal to a broader audience) I like to narrow my options … by hair color. Now I acknowledge that there’s no way I can phrase that so it doesn’t sound terribly shallow, but let’s face it, we’re all attracted to certain things and for whatever reason I’m partial to redheads, followed closely by very dark brown or black hair, and then everything else. Blondes actually are my low on my list, in defiance of every stereotype ever written about modern men. Coincidentally however, the longest and most satisfying relationship of my adult life was with a blonde woman.

To give any idea of what I’m looking for, the redhead search that I’ve just done today looks something like this:

age: between 27 and 32
distance: within 15 miles of my location
height: 4-6ft
body type: slender, athletic, curvy, average, full-figured (I’ll have to go into the reasoning behind the options I didn’t choose in a future post)
hair: auburn/red
exercise habits: 1-2 times a week, 3-4 times a week
smokes: no
drinks: socially
has kids: no
education: bachelors, associates, phd, or graduate degree

Every other option is essentially unimportant to me and even these options (for the most part) don’t entirely limit your search. For instance, I’ve come across a few smokers using this search before and honestly, I can deal with it if it’s the right person.

This particular search brings up 60 women for me. Now I’m not sure whether it’s just me or whether it’s the nature of internet dating, but maybe 10% of these people will get a second glance from me. If I had to make a guess I would say that psychologically, given a page full of potentially datable faces, makes it much easier for people to pick and choose based soley on looks. Granted when I search I make sure I see a blurb from their profiles at the same time, but at first glance, the picture speaks more. This may be because I’m a visual thinker, or it’s just a side effect of listing people in this way. All I know is that when someone takes a chance and messages me before I first message them, I’m more likely to give them a chance based on what they say as opposed to what they look like, this being both a situtation where I’m not being presented with a page of options and also one where interest has also been implied by the other party.

Now here’s where it gets weird for me. As I mentioned before, I have 6 profiles tabbed in my browser right now and if history is any indicator, I’ll likely save their profile names and look them up later. For whatever reason I can’t be bothered to make any action after finding potentially suitable profiles and I think it’s because in my backwards, intellectual, socially retarded mind any one of these people could be the last person I ever date. One of these women could be “the one” and believing as I do that there could be literally hundreds of potential “ones” out there for me, I want to make sure I pick the best possible one I can. And this is only the first of many trials I personally face with internet dating. I don’t make any excuses for it, I bring it on myself, but that’s just the way it is and I’m virtually helpless against it.

Now obviously once I begin reading these profiles I’m going to find things about them that may narrow down this selection of 6 some more. For instance, something that has become a huge turn off to me lately is people who make a point of mentioning how much they both love traveling abroad and the numerous places they’ve been. As far as I’m concered, there are two types of people in the world: idealists and non-idealists. Non-idealists have no problem with studying through college in order to procure themselves a job in a lucrative field after they graduate and these people frequently end up with more money than anyone in their 20’s should ever have and can afford to do things like travelling, learning foreign languages, and enjoying life. Idealists on the other hand go to art school or study 18th century British poetry and spend their 20’s working the kind of shitty jobs the non-idealists have managed to avoid just to make ends meet, while working desperately towards some idealized job that they may never obtain. Some people also start off as idealists, then when faced with the option of being poor for a decade, immediately change their tune. The DC area is full of idealists, people who took that one of the thousands of “consultant” positions available in the city, or that entry-level position at the law firm, ad agency, etc. These people have time to travel and tend to expect the same of others. I went to Art School, changed my major from Illustration to Film Making and spent the better part of my 20’s chasing my dream of working in video game development. I haven’t had what most would consider to be disposable income outside of the last 2 years so no, I haven’t travelled much  re: at all, outside of the country at least.

Unbridled enthusiasm for camping is another thing that gets to me, speaking mostly as someone who, while not opposed to the outdoors, has no idea to sleep in it and shit in the woods for a weekend. There are other detractors as well, but it’s not all negative, I look for attractive things as well. I’ve gone from being very picky to more forgiving in my dating taste over the last few years to the point where I have three criteria that must be met in order for someone to be “perfect” for me. She must like movies and not just the summer blockbusters, but well-made, less publicized stuff as well. She must like music, but not just the radio top 40, ideally something I’ve never heard of and that rocks. She must be smarter than me, or at least as smart; I like smart, capable women, who can match wits with me. If anyone meets these three requirements then I’m going to look for some way to get in touch with them and as of yet, I haven’t even looked at the 6 contenders in the tabs above this text block so I have no idea what’s in store for me. Things being what they are however and in observance of the fact that I have a phone call to make and dinner to prepare, the answer to that question will have to wait until later.

You’d Think It Would Get Easier

Everything I know about relationships I learned in college. When one considers the fact that college is nothing like real life and that the burdens of time and distance that seem to plague my adult attempts at relationships were virtually non-existent in my college relationship experiences, then it is safe to assume that I know nothing about relationships, let alone dating.

In college things were easy, compartively. The few relationships I had were with people I saw several times a week either in classes or passing. Keeping in contact was simple a matter of attending a mid day film class or having lunch in the cafeteria. It was easy to feign a casual attitude about it all as there was very little upkeep required to maintain your presence before someone. Dating was a much less formal affair and consisted mostly of hanging out as opposed to going out. Once a relationshop was actually established, the question of your place or mine was rarely more than a few blocks difference and for lack of money or cable television if you weren’t heading out somewhere, you were probably staying in and having sex.

I find my adult dating life to be a great deal more difficult as now my dating domain has expanded to encompass a 20 mile radius (usually the second smallest search parameter on dating sites after 5 or 10) and in doing so has taken a lot of the convenience and casualness out of it. If you’re going on a date, you both know it, because you’re driving 20 minutes to get there or taking the metro in from the suburbs. You’ll never casually meet out in the world because your worlds are separated by distance. Graned, this distance isn’t insurmountable, but it makes nearly all contact seem deliberate and the last thing women my age seem to want is a guy who’s deliberately interested. Don’t fail to keep in contact though, because she’ll lose interest in a heartbeat.

When one has managed to get beyond the rigors of dating in the real world (a process that can take weeks if not months to consummate as opposed to college’s days or hours), then the logistics of the relationship begin. Having only really dealt with this for the long term in one relationship thus far, but having knowledge of what every possible failed relationship may have been since, I can say that one better be prepared to travel.

To be quite honest, I’m not even sure what a relationship looks like under my circumstances anymore. The last legthy relationship I had was with someone who was obsessed with  me. I could have ignored her half the time and she would still want me around … and I drove 40 minutes each way for that. I can only imagine what a relationship would be like with someone who doesn’t want to develop a co-dependence with me. The one shorter relationship I had after moving to the DC area, worked only because the distance between us was small. Had we lived further away I doubt we would have tolerated each other as long as we did. It’s not that I can’t see how people do it, I’m willing to do it. It’s more a matter of my having to find someone willing to add these variables into the equation.

Yes, the logistics of dating are complex when one does not either work or study with the person they are dating, but people make it work. As the eternal pessimist about this subject however I wonder if anyone would be willing to endure these logistics for me. I suppose communication is key and maybe I should just learn to appreciate the telephone again. There was a time not long ago when I had virtually no problem with it … that is until I dated several people for whom Alexander Graham Bell’s crowning acheivement was practically demonized. Now I’m unsure about phones. It’s a rough medium to work in and I much prefer face to face, but thus is the post college dilemma.  Not everyone communicates exclusively though AIM.

In the end, all this thought on the trials of dating in the modern world leave me exhausted and I wouldn’t even be giving it any thought except that I find myself in a situation that has become all too familiar to me over the last 2 years and I’d really like for it to work out just this once. I can’t help but find it a bit depressing though, because as I visualize my triumph I realize that it is only the beginning of another trial wherein for all the reasons above. It’s all a balancing act of life, time, and expectations and I just hope I’m better at it than I think I am.