I Unintentionally Signed Up To Date An Actual Cougar
Sometimes you have to walk on the wild side to find true love.
From Hinge to Tinder, I have tried them all. Ready to give up on love, I checked the app store one last time. A new app, Me-Oww caught my eye immediately. An app for singles to meet local cougars sounded just like the new experience I was looking for. After signing a liability waiver and paying a small upfront fee of $199, I got access to the premium dating platform, a free walking stick with a note:“use only in case of emergency” and a gift card to Outback Steakhouse. A gift and a free dinner? I already liked how the life of dating a cougar was going.
Now I know what you’re thinking, “Tom, you’re crazy for wanting to date an older woman.” You’re right, but I am ready to do anything to find true love. They say everything happens for a reason, so when I found myself at my local state park at 9:45 pm last Saturday, with my new walking stick in one hand and gift card in the other; I knew fate had finally brought me to my soulmate.
Of course, I thought it was strange that she didn’t have any photos posted on her profile, but I figured she just enjoyed her anonymity. Luckily for me, she told me everything I needed to know about her: dusty blonde hair, striking blue-gray eyes and an athletic build. Although her looks sounded right up my alley, I was still nervous to meet her in person.
After waiting in the park for a couple of hours, she finally showed up. Let me tell you, she was not what I expected at all. I thought I would be meeting the older women of my dreams, but instead, it turned out she was just a real-life wild cougar.
This is the part where I’m supposed to say that I went running for the hills or I just started flailing the hiking stick around in her general vicinity. But I didn’t. Who am I to judge. We are clearly both looking for love. Who's to say that this wild cougar is or isn’t my soulmate. The least I could do was see our date out and give her a chance.
During the date, it was pretty apparent that we had a lot of differences. I am an early morning person. I love waking up at 6 am, taking a cold shower and working on the New York Times Sunday crossword puzzles. She is more of a night-goer, spending time grooming herself, stalking unsuspecting prey, and climbing trees. She is used to her isolated lifestyle and I am a social butterfly. I have been a vegetarian on and off since my preteen years and she exclusively lives on an animal-based diet. She often times dines on expired meat from the local Walmart dumpster. Although we can’t seem to agree on animal rights efforts, I do appreciate that she is at least thrifty about where she finds her meals.
My friends have hesitations about me dating a cougar, mostly because of the stigma attached to it. Honestly, they aren’t completely wrong. She does have an anger problem; which led to her ex-husband getting mauled last November. Who could blame her though, she was home all day with their three nagging kids and he couldn’t even bring home the right deer carcass for dinner. After that, their marriage fell apart and they separated. He got full custody of their kids and she was forced back into the wild. The suburbs are no place for a wild cougar.
Look. I don’t know if the racing feeling in my heart is true love or sheer terror, but I do know that it’s nice to feel something again. Our love story may be strange to some; but I refuse to go back to the monotony of one night stands, lukewarm coffee dates and hoping to bump into someone at the local watering hole.
