Unexplored Options

Well, I’ve done it. I’ve become my own Lewis and Clark of resolve and exploration following the Sacajawea of eHarmony across a vast and hitherto undiscovered terrain of searching singles.

It was a pretty sudden switchover. I’ve been against online dating on principle for a very long time. I thought it wasn’t putting enough faith in God to bring someone along that I could meet for the first time face-to-face. I thought it was reckless and foolish (what? Meet a stranger for dinner? It’s worse than blind dating! What if he’s a predator?). I thought it was for losers who couldn’t hope to meet anyone unless they hid their faces behind a computer screen.

Until I turned into one of those losers. I was having a conversation with MP the other night and we were writing down strategies for meeting new people. Looking at the list, I realized I would have to make over my entire leisure time structure in order to do it. Because all of the things I most love to do don’t take me out of the house. What are my favorite hobbies? Reading, writing, cooking, knitting, watching TV on DVD, hanging out with my cat, and eating dinner with friends. I don’t tend to meet new people in my apartment; if I did, I would probably shoot them. I just don’t get out much, and that’s the kind of person I am – I like the comforts of home.

I do enjoy the occasional trip to a city, the occasional outing to a botanical garden or a beach, but when I do it’s never to meet people; I go to visit friends, or take friends along for company. I’m reticent and shy with strangers. I strongly prefer the known to the unknown.

Which severely limits my options. About the only workable strategy I have for meeting new people in South Bend is to go to the Notre Dame law library for bogus research projects for my boss in hopes of stumbling across an up-and-coming young lawyer. Other than that, I’m sunk. This isn’t an age when it’s easy to meet people. I’ve given up on finding someone in church. The people I meet at work are criminals or future divorces, and my boss and his wife don’t socialize much, and don’t know anyone my age. I am one of four staff members in the office, so there’s no hopes of meeting some interesting male coworker. I haven’t met any serious-relationship material through my friends in the grad school. My family is far away, so it’s hard for them to recommend anyone. And with there being a strong undercurrent of No Community in neighborhoods and cities – no barn dances or barbecues or socials – you don’t run into people much outside of church, work, friends and family.

Which leaves the online community. In an era without community matchmaking, where your friends and neighbors aren’t actively seeking to marry you off, these online dating systems provide the next-best thing – a supervised method for getting to know people who are looking for a serious relationship. You don’t really have to sweat a person’s intentions – they’re right there on the screen. You can survey their personality and interests, their goals and life pursuits in a rational manner, to see if this is someone you can picture being with. And it’s fairly safe.

So I went to eHarmony, which has the best recommendations, and filled out their survey to get my Personality Profile. It was dead-on, by the way. And what I liked about it were three things:

1. The only options were "I’m a man seeking a woman" or "I’m a woman seeking a man." I just really liked that – it means the site is marriage-minded (sorry, some of you).
2. It was founded by a Christian.
3. The survey didn’t focus as much on interests and hobbies as on personality and pursuits – who I am, what I want out of life, and what I want out of a partner. Because really, it doesn’t matter if (and is unlikely that) the man I marry likes exactly the same literature, music, and movies that I do. What matters is whether what we want out of life, and our characters, are compatible. Can we live together? That’s the real question, and this website matches people based on those lines.

I hung back from actually subscribing – that’s the dive into perilous water. Until this morning when I was notified that one of my matches had requested communication. As I only have two matches so far (I KNEW I was a tough one to match – I even clicked on four different states), I thought, well, here goes...and took the plunge.

So I’m now a member for a year, and have one more bill to pay, but the more time passes, the stronger I feel God’s call to family. Two years ago, when I was looking to leave the retail business, but had no idea where to go next, MP asked me, "What do you really want? Don’t think about it, just answer. What’s your ideal job?" And I said, "Not to have one." And now it’s become not just a wistful yearning for the future, but a purpose. Every other ambition and goal pales to that call. I’m supposed to be a wife and a mother. I’ve been praying about it for months. If I’m going to walk in obedience, I need to stop hanging around waiting for God to make it happen. It’s time for me to "strain toward what is ahead," not just hope for it. I have my part to do, too.

So, maybe you think I’m insane, or the years of singleness have turned my rational brain to pudding. But I’m tired of this. I’m tired of being alone. I want more.

This appears to be a reasonable option. At the very least, it’s a way to meet people who are similar to me, and it should yield some great stories.

(Okay, someone come out of the woodwork to support me.)