The first time I engaged in an online discussion with
someone from a dating site, it wasn’t to flirt or arrange a date; it was to
learn the ropes.
This lady, by her own admission, had been on and off the
sites for 4 or 5 years. She gave me
quite a few tips on the female rules, such as a woman should never go to
someone’s house on a first date, always meet somewhere public and get a friend
or relative to make a call about half an hour in which is to see if a) all is
well or b) offer a potential get out should the date be a disaster. Oh, and never chat to someone who doesn’t
have a photo on their profile.
Wasn’t that a bit shallow? Apparently not – you need to be able to make
sure that the person is who they say they are, plus you need to recognise them
if you were to meet.
Still not totally convinced, I said that I had heard
several stories about people using false or ancient photos anyway, so did that
really matter? She didn’t really have a
satisfactory response to that one, but did go on to say that she hadn’t found
that to be the case in her experience.
However, she had found that men usually lie about their height, unless
they were tall, naturally.
That just struck me as the most ridiculous lie ever. Surely the truth would be discovered within
nano-seconds of the date starting and sometimes even beforehand if the woman
happened to see him in the car park? Of
course, but that didn’t alter the fact that she’d been out with plenty of men
whose stated height was six foot plus but who had turned out to be under five
foot six. As she was nearly six feet
tall herself, this was a complete turn off for her and bearing in mind that her
cleavage was one of her best assets (her words – I never met her to find out)
it was always off putting when it was at eye level with her date. Before cutting the evening short, she always
used to ask why the man had lied and the answer was usually the same; “Because
if I put my real height down I wouldn’t get any dates. Once I get in front of someone, I have a
chance to show them my personality and then maybe the height won’t matter.”
Ok, I can see that logic, albeit that it is a tactic
which is unlikely to succeed. But is it right to actually commence a
relationship based on a lie?
I therefore decided that I would not lie about anything
on my profile and would be absolutely and totally honest. Foolishly I assumed that everyone had the
same standards. After all, women
wouldn’t need to lie about their height, would they?
Well, no. But what
I did find is that they lied about their age.
Not everyone of course, but apparently that is the most common lie a
woman tells in their dating profile.
One woman I started chatting to put her age as 45 and
looked absolutely stunning. Amazingly,
she made the initial contact with me (that in itself was unusual as the only
people who had done that had been those desperate to escape from places like
Russia, Ghana or Nigeria and who somehow were ALWAYS 28 years old) and after a
few emails and phone calls, we decided to meet.
Following my rules (see earlier blogposts) I arranged to go to her area,
which was about 40 miles away. I picked
her up from her home, which was a beautiful farmhouse-style property in about 2
acres of land in a rural setting. I
wasn’t invited in, but as she stepped out of the house it was clear her
pictures didn’t do her justice. She was
simply gorgeous with a clearly well-toned and worked on figure, so there was
some instant chemistry. We set off for a restaurant and had a fantastic Thai
meal, getting on like a house on fire and obviously sharing a similar sense of
humour. The evening flew by as we
chatted, finding out about each other’s backgrounds and previous
experiences. Apparently she had tried
the sites before and failed as there were too many “weirdo men” who she seemed
to attract but was sick of her own company and decided to have another try. She
had found my profile “refreshingly honest” (irony alert) and had also been
pleasantly surprised that my pictures didn’t do me justice either.
Her story was that she had left school and gone to work
for the company her father had part owned (which was a multinational household
name so there was clearly wealth in the family) where she stayed for 14 years
until the birth of her two sons, now 23 and 22 and coming out of Uni. Her marriage had dissolved a few years ago
and she was currently studying Law by correspondence course, hoping to
eventually qualify as a solicitor.
So had I found “the one”?
Clever, witty, self-sufficient, attractive and also apparently
interested in me!
At the end of the evening, we were the last to leave the
restaurant and I drove her home. Again, I wasn’t invited in but we did arrange
to meet up again the following week and there was also talk of a weekend away
in a month or two, if everything went well.
My head was full of future anticipation on the hour long
journey back, but there was something nagging at me that I couldn’t put my
finger on. Then it hit me… she was 45,
her eldest son was 23 and she had worked for 14 years… what age was she when
she left school? 8? Clearly not – school
leaving age was 16 minimum which made her 53 and maybe 54 depending on what
month her birthday was.
I spoke to her the following day and asked her to clarify
again… maybe I had misheard or misunderstood… I so wanted to give her the
benefit of the doubt. However, when I
mentioned it, she just exploded into an angry rage on the other end of the
phone, accused me of “checking up on her”, said that “people like me were
EXACTLY why she left the site before”, delivered a final foul mouthed tirade
and hung up, warning me never to contact her again.
So she can’t remember to make the dates work to fit her
deception and yet it’s somehow my fault?
Further, she couldn’t even be honest once she’d been found out as she “admitted”
she was 49 (again, at least 4 years shy) and also said she had done it because
otherwise she didn’t get dates from people she wanted to go out with. She couldn’t see that it really wasn’t a nice
thing to lie in order to get something you wouldn’t normally have, so I think I
had a lucky escape there.
What most intrigued me, however, was that if she had
managed to cover it up and we had really hit it off, when was she actually
planning to tell me? Would I have been
planning her 50th only to be told by one of her sons, “Look, Mum had
that eight years ago!” I think I would
have questioned everything she had ever told me at that point. As Friedrich Nietzsche said, “I'm
not upset that you lied to me, I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you.”
So, bearing in mind that
she could have easily been 45 if looks and personality were the measure, would
the age have mattered if I had known at the outset? Well, probably, yes. My partner Dawn is nearly 10 years younger
than I am and that was a big hurdle for me to overcome. It wasn’t the current age difference that
bothered me, but what the condition of my body would be in 20 years’ time. I was looking for a long term relationship
and someone I could grow old with, not necessarily to be looked after by. It did take me some time to accept that Dawn
really, really didn’t care and in any event, she loves old people (bloody
cheek!). I guess by the time we get to
middle age we are who we are, we know what we like and – most importantly – what
we don’t like or are prepared to accept.
After all, you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.
