YOU REEK WHAT YOU SOW

     Obediently following format for the uninitiated, the dating site recommended protecting my anonymity with a moniker. Attempts at  creating a user name were already in my problematic personal memory bank.  I have been consistent in choosing a name already taken.  Using it usually requires the inclusion of a string of numbers, a capital letter, and an underscore, all of which I was sure to forget. Online, this not really a user name, but the alias that would be associated with my photo. Something for others to use to recognize, remember, and address you. This was also supposed to say something about me. Checking out some of the other members, it became obvious that there were a few basic forms. Other than initials and a zip code, or text talk,  (UWNT2BWTHME), women seem to prefer cute and sweet like Cutiepie, Puppytoes, or physical feature like Deadly Dimples,or Great Headlights. Men seem to love fantasy, sport or what they might use at the ATM. Sean Connery would probably be interested to know that there are easily 2,758 James Bonds working his rep.

     Never being a cute type, and endowed with the omnipresent  brown hair and brown eyed genes, I thought I would try my most beloved insect. I typed in Dragonfly. Hard for me to believe, but a large number of women were also bug oriented. There were already numerous dragonflies buzzing this site. I tried exotic flowers, my nationality, locations, animals…all were already in use. Two hours of search and destroy past my dragonfly dilemma, I decided on plagiarism and ended up scanning my film collection. My fingers stopped at an old VHS. I knew this was the one. I became Piewhacket, the Siamese that Kim Novack used to seduce Jimmy Stewart in “Bell, Book, and Candle”. It had a nice snap, no graceful roll off the tongue and was obscure enough to not need numerical additions.

     Naively, I didn’t realize how old “Dear Piewhacket” was to become.

     The format also required a profile title. This time I had no shame in heading directly to my book shelf and movie collection.

“Rear Window?” -  Too many implications.

“Gone with the Wind?” - Was that going to imply commitment issues or a lack of optimism?

“The Second Coming?”…Yeats had no idea.

     Tucked discretely in the stacks was a book by Alice Hoffman, “Probable Future”. A little prefix change to suit my mindset and it became “Improbable Future”. Off to deal with the body of this project.

     I tackled their multiple choice questionnaire, easily the length of my thesis, answering honestly. Sometimes I am just too literal. I didn’t realize this was an exercise in creative writing particularly regarding age, body shape, height, income, and profession. Age and body shape are the most liberally answered. Online, everyone is fit and toned and a few years less that any ten year milestone.

     “In my own words” is the only non formatted section and seems to make most people the least comfortable. I was a little offended that I was expected to sum myself up into 1200 characters or less. Frustrated, exhausted, and long out of patience I decided to just get the thing finished.

     My synopsis of self, was quickly resembling a resume for the circular file, or a version of the “Neverending Story”. I kept on getting a message that I had exceeded the “character” limit. (Wait until I start dating.) Either way, it was dying, and I was going to put myself out of it’s misery. Cut, paste, upload, and I shut down the computer.

    Lesson 1 – No matter how lousy a profile you write, decent pictures will carry you for a while.

     Virtually no one went past the photos. I was getting emails from religious fanatics in Arkansas, 5’4”, who didn’t finish high school, and who waited with bated breath for the tailgate on the fourth of July. I could almost hear the toothpick being flicked from one corner of his mouth to the other. (These were not my specs.)

    Either no one read these works of art, or mine was too boring. I went back to see just how unreadable it was. My Achilles heel of poor typing, rethinking sentences mid- stream, and not proofing was staring me in the face. I looked like I seriously needed an ESL course, was lying about my education---all while beginning to nod out.

     I couldn’t figure out a way to present who I am, and what I’m looking for, how I think, without sounding like everyone else. Looking at it from the opposite angle, I decided to concentrate on who I was looking for. With montage of a Frank Frazetta warrior, Sting, Atticus Finch, and Chet Baker’s voice in my head, I actually had fun…my first public romantic fantasy. No one was going to read it anyway.

LESSON 2 – over 20,000 visits to my profile later, I was wrong. Some people do read, and read closely.