Group therapy in a blog.
Online Dating
Brilliant Insight Found
2817 years
In perusing some of my regular dating-related reads, I caught up on my friend JDater Joe, who had the following to say about JDate after corresponding with a woman who then disappeared. (Hilary? Is this another victim of The Bus?)
“When you haven’t met the other party, you end up having a relationship with yourself so it’s always better than it turns out.”
Is this the problem? Should we meet immediately, to avoid becoming lulled into the comfort of a relationship with ourselves, whose company we already love?
Fake Jewess Rides JDate to Closure
117 years
We hear a lot about non-Jews using Jdate to seek out Jewish dates. One more recent post is over at the JTA, actually not written by me. (As the descendants of the Marx Brothers and Woody Allen, we’re not sure why anyone would want to be part of the club that would have us as members, but…) But here’s a new spin, as someone named Fake Jewess writes in the Jerusalem Post about falling in love with a Jewish guy. They’re together, they’re magic, and then they’re over:
We had an awful fight. We said awful things. I cried every day for weeks, until he called. He sounded meek, not the blustering, brainy jokester I knew. “I miss you,” he said. “Me too.” We agreed to be friends. And with some prescience, I made him swear he would be the one to tell me when and if he got married.
Being “just friends” was rough. He scrutinized me for flaws, determined to find them. (I sometimes made this very easy for him.) “You and I are not viable,” he wrote tersely. Soon, we were no longer talking.
Selfishly, I could only think of how achingly I missed him. He had once told me that he used JDate to meet women. I began checking the site to see if any profile rang a bell. It wasn’t long before I recognized him. Oh, he had fudged some facts, but I would know him anywhere, my Jewish Guy.
I had to talk to him. But I was afraid, as “not viable” me. So I created a JDate profile.
What happens next is actually a surprisingly touching story of how love gone wrong remains a mystery and can eat at our curiosity, and the lengths we go to to learn the sources of our disappointment. Not everything has a rom-com ending. And maybe that’s ok.
LAist Joins JDate
417 years
I’m kind of surprised that Gothamist didn’t think of this first, but LAist has joined JDate…or at least one of their writers does. Calling herself Jewgirl, one of their writers submits to JDate membership as writing and dating experiment:
I’m not necessarily looking for “the oneâ€Â, but certainly someone who is nice and cute and funny. That’s not too much to ask for, right? I mean, if they happen to be nice, cute, funny, tattooed, artistic AND Jewish, all the better…
I guess she thinks these are realistic expectations. And maybe they are. And I applaud her decision to keep her own identity–and the identities of the men she has dates with–anonymous. As you know, I’m a firm believer in “just because he’s not for me doesn’t mean he’s not for someone,” and keeping it all anonymous helps us all stay positive, and not drag anyone’s reputation unnecessarily through the dating mud.
I also have questions: how long do you think it will be until she goes out with Evan? Or will she use E-Cyrano’s services to help improve her profile? Does she know Hilary? Does being Jewish really matter to her, or is it just a parental preference she’d like to satisfy?
Whatever the answers, I hope she has better luck than most of the others of us who have dated and documented our efforts. May she experience some great men who give us all reasons to believe that there are others–maybe even non-tattooed ones–out there.
JLove Freebie for Singles, through February 15
917 years
JLove, the online dating website that’s positioning itself as the market challenger of JDate (and founded by a former founder of JDate), is giving the gift of mail to single users this week…if you’re a non-premium member, you are being granted the chance to read your accumulated emails through the 15th for free. And if you want to send emails to a promising JLove user, that’s free too.
Of course, I would recommend that you not send emails like these two, the ones that were in my inbox when I redeemed this free offer…[original spellings preserved, of course]:
Subject: hello
“How are you? I like your profile and picture. You look pretty. Have a good weekend.”
Result: attempt to view profile blocked…”this profile is currently unavailable”
Subject: hello baby!
Message: I AM INTERESTED IN YOU. I LIVE IN MEXICO. COULD YOU DROP SOME LINES TO ME AT: [email address deleted] ??? THANKS YOU BEAUTIFUL BABY. I HOPE YOUR ANSWER. SO LONG.
Result: Moving to Mexico. Of course. We’re perfect together, can’t you see?
So don’t say JLove never got you anything for Valentine’s Day. Because three days of free membership privileges is better than you ever got at JDate, right?
Single Semite of the Month: Evan Marc Katz
2717 years
If Evan Marc Katz‘s name doesn’t sound familiar to you, it should. I’ve certainly mentioned him before–I met him about three years ago, in the early days of my column, at a UJC Young Leadership conference in Washington, DC, where he spoke to a packed room of frustrated daters about what they’re doing wrong with their dating profiles. I’ll admit it now…at first, I thought his advice (particularly about banning adjectives from my online profile) was a lot of hooey. But as I thought about it, I learned that the author of “I Can’t Believe I’m Buying This Book: A Commonsense Guide to Successful Internet Dating” was right–my profile was much better after I took a red pen to it and eliminated some of those murky, non-helpful adjectives. (It didn’t help me get more online dates, but that’s another story.) That’s not the whole secret to fixing online dating profiles, but it’s one of the things Evan covers in the book and also for clients of his company, E-Cyrano.com.
Then Evan published his next book, “Why You’re Still Single: Things Your Friends Would Tell You If You Promised Not to Get Mad,” a title which actually made me a little mad, but the book itself was a funny, relatable “he-said, she-said” of a read that made me feel a little better. Other people were going through this stuff too.
Over the years, Evan and I have become friends, and usually I get to see him when I’m in LA, and we talk about dating and relating and all that. He’s funny, and it’s “smart-funny,” not “stupid-funny.” (Plus, although he woulda been a contenduh even with his long curly hair, the new “clean-cut” style really brings out those eyes, that smile…)
Even so, somehow I never thought of Evan as a SSOTM until I read his latest article in Match.com’s Happen Magazine, chronicling what it’s like to be the “Last Single Guy Standing“:
Then I hit my mid-thirties. I started to take stock of my methods and was forced to wonder whether I was my own worst enemy. I suddenly felt something beyond longing for connection… I found myself with a real sense of urgency about settling down. A strange, deeply buried ticking clock of sorts. I actually found myself thinking things like, “If I fell in love tomorrow, got engaged in six months, got married in a year and had a child a year later, I’d still be in my late fifties by the time my kid graduated college.†I know. It’s nuts.
No more nuts than any of the rest of us who lived our lives imagining our own marriage timelines. Some of us planned to marry at 23, have a kid at 25, then again at 28 and 31, and be cool, hip moms well into our 50s. (Oh, not me; “a friend.”) But welcome to the world of the serious dater, maybe thinking ahead too much, too early, but needing to be serious in order to get serious. And unfortunately, Evan happens to be a dating coach, so there’s always going to be someone who says, “you’re still single, so what do you know?” (Believe me, singles columnists hear that too.)
So here he is, kids. The first in my resurrected series of “Single Semite of the Month.” And the reluctant poster child for Valentine’s Day. And a hell of a good guy.
(Have nominees for Single Semite of the Month? Send your suggestions to Jdatersanonymous at gmail dot com. And join our Facebook group to discuss suggestions and the decisions of the judges as SSOTMs are chosen…)
Date a Baldwin
117 years
He’s 48, with sparkling blue eyes, a hit sitcom, a featured role in a Martin Scorcese film, and a lifelong ticket to hosting Saturday Night Live. He’d love to be married again, and have more kids. And he’s looking for love. He’s even willing to consider online dating:
In a tongue-in-cheek interview in the February issue of Glamour, Baldwin says he’s thought about dipping into the online-dating scene, and jokingly imagines the kind of responses he might get. “I could post my picture and say, ‘People tell me I look like Alec Baldwin.’ They’ll go, ‘Oh, I hate him’ or ‘Who the hell is he?’ “
JDaters Anonymous loves Alec Baldwin. Even if his brother and his ministry would likely try to convert me. (Check out his book trailer–that’s right, a book trailer–here. Or read the first chapter, with tales of partying at the Playboy mansion with Robert Downey Jr, how the “brother dynasty” got started, and how he refused to play the pos “Usual Suspects” Hollywood game that could have launched him to superstardom and instead chose to co-star with Pauly Shore in “Bio-Dome.” No joke.)
“Single Mom” Takes NYC
717 years
Last night I attended a Barnes & Noble reading by Rachel Sarah, my J dating column colleague and single Jewish mom, not to mention author of the new book “Single Mom Seeking.” Then we met up for breakfast this morning, and schmoozed about my return from Israel, her return to New York from Berkeley, and how dating is different when your daughter is also a factor in any nascent relationship.
The book’s entertaining, with raw accounts that any dater–with or without children–will relate to. Everything from trying to conquer chemistry with rationality to choosing your words carefully when it comes to online dating profiles sounds eminently familiar to the modern dater.
I’m hopefully going to be doing a JW column about her soon, so stay tuned for that. In the meantime, check out her website and blog. And if you contact her or leave a comment, make sure to tell her Esther sent you…
Evan’s Amazing Gigs
617 years
He advises singles the world over through his work at E-Cyrano.com, and is brought on-board a recent JDate excursion to Club Med Turks & Caicos (where the sand is so soft and the water so clear and warm you wouldn’t ever want to leave) to be the dating expert in residence. A tough job, but someone’s got to do it.
From the report, it seems like everyone had a great time–which I somehow doubt. From the number of women quoted (5) vs. the number of men quoted (1, 2 if you count Evan) I wonder if that represents a) that women are more forthcoming about how they feel at events like this or b) that there was that much of a discrepancy in the ratio of participants in general. (I don’t know one way or the other, I just wonder.) And by the way, I have a friend who actually met her boyfriend (they now live together) at one of the JDate Club Med trips; but they didn’t “hook up” during the trip. They stayed friends with the group of people they hung out with at the resort, and sometime thereafter began dating in a more normal context.
Now, Yahoo Personals obtains Evan’s predictions for how dating will change in 2007:
“…the 20- and 30-something players stop playing and start getting serious. The dating sites realize that they need to produce a higher quality product to help their clients succeed and offer services that create better transparency such as background checks, rating systems and video chat.”
Do you have predictions for 2007 about how dating (online and offline) is going to change? If you could change one thing about the way dating has gone (for you or for others) in the past, what would it be?
Fetishizing Frumkeit
1117 years
I just know that this is going to be one of those posts…the ones where comments get out of control and the subject matter extends into the NC-17 area and everyone starts arguing. But apparently–and this will be no news to (or reflection on) some of you–there are people out there who fetishize religious objects, behaviors and people. And now that I’m on Facebook, I apparently have a whole group of researchers combing the internet for weird Craigslist postings. And since I had to read them, now I have to share them with you–not to titillate, but to inform. So if you’re one of my more religious readers who is offended by the intersection of fornication and frumkeit, turn this demon machine off now. I warned you.
We’ll start with one that’s not so out of control…looking for a nice “shiksa with a thing for frummers/hasidim?” Who isn’t? This post isn’t crazy–just some nice non-Jewish woman who’s looking for a frum guy to show her a good time. She’s even willing to consider conversion. So, why the attraction to frumminess? Not sure. But while this predilection may be unusual, at least she’s not a total wacko.
Avenue Q taught us all what the internet is for. So it shouldn’t surprise us when someone posts a graphic desire to give oral satisfaction to religious women only. Or, as the dude himself puts it, “I only do frum women.”
If you want a nice Shabbos meal followed by a romp in his bedroom for “desert” — and if you follow the vilna gaon’s “sheetah” on gardening “your business,”–this is the dude for you.
Last summer, I was sitting at Tal Bagels in Jerusalem when a dude started talking to me about what I was writing. I told him “a singles column” and he said, “oh, what kind of sway does rabbinic yichus have when shadchanim are arranging matches?” I said I didn’t know–that’s never come up in my dating life at all (even though someone in my family, and in his, come to think of it, claimed to be related to the Vilna Gaon). But now I’d have to say that there are even dudes who not just want someone with rabbinic lineage, but actually get turned on by rabbinic yichus.
And of course, if brevity is the soul of wit, admire this guy for cutting to the chase: ” I want to have a real scandal in my family by doing it with someone not jewish.”
The beauty (and the shame) of Craigslist is that there’s always more. If you want it.
(For more discussion on this, see Jewbiquitous.)
Is “Playing Hard to Get” a Non-Issue in the Digital Age?
917 years
This past Friday night, I did a Bloggers’ Roundtable at the Town & Village Synagogue in downtown NYC, featuring participation from the venerable bloggers of BlogsofZion, Kesher Talk, Shabot6000 and Jewschool. And my column in the Jewish Week for this week focused on “Dating 2.0“–a new model for approaching relationships in the digital age. So when a reader/attendee at the roundtable approached me afterwards and asked me about “playing hard to get” and whether women should engage in this, I thought before answering.
My immediate response was that playing hard to get, a la “The Rules” was ridiculous. That there’s a number of days minimum that women should wait before agreeing to date a particular gentleman caller seems antiquated and a little too game-oriented for my taste. But anecdotal evidence does seem to suggest that men do enjoy a bit of a challenge–if something or someone is accessible, it doesn’t seem to be as thrilling or filled with accomplishment as something that’s a little less so. So being available at every moment–or to quote Ms. Roberts-as-celluloid-hooker, “a beck-and-call girl”–might not be the best idea either. Not always being available when he calls also helps to avoid becoming his melancholy booty call baby or his inadvertent friend-with-not-all-the-
benefits-you-were-looking-for, and might help weed out people who don’t have a serious interest.
But once you’re playing the game, there are risks. Not being available can also be interpreted as lack of interest. (Not disinterest, which is something different: see William Safire in this weekend’s NY Times Magazine.) Plus, in the digital age, people are a lot more accessible than they used to be. Back in the day, if you left your house or your office, you couldn’t be reached by telephone. You were off the grid. But today, people can always get a hold of you, via phone, cell, email, pager, Sidekick, texting or whatever. “Hard to get” isn’t the problem.
So my response is this: one should not “play” anything. But constant availability, to the detriment of your own emotional well-being, is also not good. It’s about knowing your balance and what you want out of a relationship. If you want long-term serious, don’t settle for being an FWB. If what you want is an FWB, then don’t get involved with someone who wants a long-term relationship. If you tend to get sucked into long IM conversations with “potentials” who never make a move beyond the message window, just say no. If you tend to respond too eagerly when a potential calls, screen your incoming calls…you can always call them right back if it’s urgent, and if it isn’t, it can wait, and probably should.
So in short, gameplaying, bad. Knowing what you need, good.
But that’s just one person’s opinion. Now’s the part when you tell me that I’m wrong, or that I’m “right, but…”