Online dating
Online Dating Was Love at First Site
Love in life’s last quarter
It was early Christmas morning in 2011.
My 90-year-old mother was visiting and snoring away in the front room.
I was sitting in my favorite recliner feeling blue on this White Christmas.
A year and a half earlier, a decade after a divorce, I joined Match.com and eHarmony.
My former wife had mentioned she had started online dating.
Why not, I thought. I’m 60 and still, well, vital.
If you know what I mean.
Carolyn was my first date.
Our experience was a harbinger.
After exchanging a few emails, we met for coffee at a Panera Bread halfway between our homes.
On the way home, the late afternoon sky seemed brighter.
I discovered how much I missed connecting with a woman.
My age.
I met many ladies throughout 2010 and 2011.
In three cases, including Carolyn, coffee evolved into something else.
Without knowing it, I interrogated 60-year-old Paul about what mature love meant.
What qualities was he looking for in a partner? Where did intimacy fit? Should he trust his feelings? How to know chemistry? Does she have dealbreakers? Do I?
Most importantly, each of us brought along a past. First-date coffees were crowded: former spouses, children, grandchildren, friends, and home communities. I wrote about that here.
It wasn’t such a steep learning curve.
But it required time and experience.
And sometimes, more than coffee.
The online process — Match bios and photos, email conversations, get-to-know-you coffees — took the terror out of meeting a date for the first time.
I loved every second of it.
Even the disappointments.
On that Christmas morning in 2011, I was bummed because a few days earlier, Maureen had decided three dates were enough.
In later-in-life dating, standards were high. We know too much to be easily fooled, even by our feelings.
Maureen’s Dear John email was kind and sensitive.
I had labored over a couple myself.
Still, I was hurting.
When hurt, I straighten things or delete them.
eHarmony allowed its members to save matches they wanted to reconsider before canceling.
Mourning Maureen, I was going through my saved matches.
Taking five minutes to decide whether to save or delete.
I don’t remember how many matches I saved.
But Rebecca was one of them.
Her bio had come a few days earlier.
Even though she shouldn’t have been there at all.
We’re pretty sure this is one of two photos Rebecca included with her eHarmony bio. She’s standing with her grandson Elan who is one.
In the first photo, that’s Ilan seven years later with sister Sivan. Ilan is explaining this is where he stood all those years ago.
Rebecca’s second photo was the kicker and unfair, as one of her other matches would say during their coffee date.
She’s bent down with her arms wrapped around a dog that looks like the Obama family’s Bo. A plus. Also, Rebecca’s not posing.
She was the anti-selfie before selfies became a thing.
The same with the ocean picture.
Also, the legs. And look.
But there was a problem.
Rebecca lived in Clarinda, Iowa.
I went to my car in the garage to get an Iowa road map.
Southwest, Iowa. I’m in the northeast.
Back in those days, we used Mapquest to provide mileage and directions.
The red line on the map was the crow route. We’d be earthbound.
323 miles.
eHarmony had ignored my 300-mile distance limit.
Unknown to me, Rebecca had her own rule.
She didn’t initiate.
My delete would complete.
“Merry Christmas,” said my mom from the hallway.
“Dear Rebecca,” I wrote in our first email.
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Joan Gershman wrote a helpful online dating guide here, tongue in cheek. Verbieann Hardy’s poignant success story is here.
Robin James’ dating as an older person writing prompt is here.
