Looking for Love on Craig’s List: Why Don’t Relationships Begin

Coffee man and I have independently agreed that this is not to become a relationship. Before I go any further, I would like to state that I was not the relationship coward; I was the one who, on Wednesday morning, emailed him stating this conclusion from our date on Sunday. A little while later he got back to me to affirm that conclusion. I wonder if the fact that I spoke up and he did not is why this was yet another case of a non-click.

Was he planning to not get back to me and let me come to my own conclusion that it ended before it began? And me, while I was expecting to hear from him regarding his suggestion that we do something more exciting next time we go out (instead of dinner, although I was wary since he didn’t state a specific day, which is what he had been doing up until then), was thinking about how to tell him that it’s just not going anywhere. But there was no way that I would not tell him that, it seems so cowardly and not where I am in this mature woman’s desire to be upfront as much as possible in my relationships with boys. So, his reticence and my upfrontness (okay, brash, maybe I have become brash?) did not make clarions call.

After contemplating our few dates, and the few dates with men who came before him, I have realized that dating is not about one person being boring or uninteresting, it’s about how two people who are probably (possibly) not boring and uninteresting appear to be that way to each other. There was nothing “wrong” with him, and (I hope) there was nothing wrong with me (except my brashness, and I am sure that there are some who would find charm in my New York-Israel-Virginia personality combo), it was just the two of us that flopped and foundered. I had always thought to term people who didn’t click with me as being boring, but I finally get it, that interpersonal chemistry thing, it’s no one’s fault.

An hour before our final date (of four) I picked up my younger daughter from a friend’s house (note: after the age of eleven it can no longer be referred to as a “playdate,” rather it is hanging out). I talked to the boy’s father (yes, one of her BFFs is a boy) for a few minutes. We talked, laughed, and joked. And then I went inside and talked to his mother, who seems to like to talk and laugh as much as I do. What ensued was the mommy-mommy talk that gives the kids at least another twenty-minutes of “hanging out” time. In that time we covered: Sarah Palin, teen pregnancy, gossip from Alaska (thanks Carly), Bat Mitzvahs, chicken wings and chicken wing places, Baja Fresh, dating, silent auctions, and how incredibly tall my daughter is getting and why does she have such long legs unlike her mother. Our conversation covered more and was livelier than my date, by far.

It’s not that I want to date my daughter’s friends’ mothers, but why is it that it’s so much easier to find women with whom I click and not men? Is it the whole “similarity of experience” thing, where we virtually speak in shorthand, we get each other so well. Or is it that my daughter has already done a pre-screening and if her friends pass the test to flow with her personality, the parents will flow with mine as well? I once wrote an essay titled, “My Daughter, My Pimp,” in which I talked about how all of my friends at that time were mothers of my older daughter’s friends (this is the daughter who minutes ago called me “the biggest fucking bitch” because I cancelled her Netflix subscription because she is so defiant and nasty, so we are going back a long way). So I know that there are people I get along with, and I don’t think that it is “faked,” those doorway friendships, so why is it so hard to find a man with whom I can freely talk and joke?

I’m not kidding here—I want to figure this out. Is it just that I have not met any clickable men? Is it that I don’t do a good Craig’s List screening? Is it really that men and women are so different in outlook and mindset that only the attraction enables them to overcome those natural differences? TM (Transition Man) and I had great email and in-person conversations, and I always wanted to be touching him (up until the end when I was too pissed off and hurt). Is it that without sexual tension there is no conversational click? Or is it that without an attraction I don’t (or am unable to) “put out” in the conversation?

Is this a chicken and an egg scenario? Or is it my libido dictating? If there’s no physical click, then there’s no mental click. I guess that makes it easier to say “ciao baby.” But if just feels harder, to not find someone to talk to or tryst with, repeatedly. Maybe I need to ask my mommy friends if they know of someone. But I’m thinking that if they knew someone they would already have suggested them. Oh, well. I still believe that there’s a click in my future.

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Comments

[JC]

Oh, there's a click out there. You just haven't come across him yet. I have a couple friends, one male and one female, and they've both been through the dating services -- eharmony, match.com. Both didn't like eharmony. One started dating and now is engaged to his research assistant (who's about 20 years younger) and the other's still on I think match.com.

I have another friend who met her future husband online (I think it was match.com). They met at Starbucks for coffee and stayed for three hours. Of course, my friend can talk pretty much nonstop, if you let her. They clicked, although they're so different from each other. Anyway, at 54, she's really, really happy.

Dating -- what, um, fun. There's a click for you, but it will probably happen when you least expect it (you just need to find someone who can keep up with you).

[April]

I am SO not one to give advice on this. I can only say, I feel your pain.

[Laura of Rebellious Thoughts of a Woman]

JC: I think the universe is balancing things out: I met mr. ex on a bus six months after college, so I am lacking in the years of angst-ridden dating experience. I guess that there is no learning anything the easy way. The dating sites, no one ever seems to click me (or at least men that don't resemble the guy you laugh at in the movies, and who like to play darts), so I gave up. I give up too easily, perhaps, but at this time in my life, I would rather not be feeling rejected.

April: Pain in numbers? Is there some kind of epiphany there? Oh yes, it's that you are not alone. So in being alone, I am not alone, now that makes me feel so much better.

[Teri Pittman]

There are clicks out there and probably more than you think. My husband of 37 years died in October and I thought that would be the end of relationships for me. That second night he was in the ICU, I was waiting out in the waiting room with a friend. A man stopped by to talk. His wife of 21 years was also in the ICU with pneumonia. We talked awhile and he left. I bumped into him several more times and we talked about what was happening with us. Our spouses died within a day of each other. We stayed in touch by phone and email, discussing things most people never have to talk about, like dealing with cremation ashes. Within weeks, we both realized that we were attracted to each other. And so, here we are living together. It's not a way that I would recommend to met men. I think it's unlikely that I would have been able to sort out dating, since I got married at 19 and am pretty clueless about it. And odds were against something like this happening. So I would say, don't give up and keep looking.

[Laura of Rebellious Thoughts of a Woman]

Teri, what a sad but beautiful way to reaffirm life and love. I'm still hopeful, but I must say, I am beginning to feel content in my aloneness, which might be good for me and for a relationship, if one should happen, somewhere.