Diary of a Professional Overthinker – Entry 8.

 

I decided to try a dating app called OkCupid which made me feel like I should switch my brain off on the way in. 

It took about two days for my profile to clock up the maximum likes (and no, my breasts did not take up centre stage in the photos). I couldn’t see who liked me because I was a non-paying member. Did I want to pay the premium to see them? Them who made me feel very seen… in the way a piece of meat feels seen by a swarm of blowflies.   

The app asked me to fill out a bunch of questions which were supposed to match me with one of the potential Diptera. 

One question was on religion, one was on political preference, one was on astrology. Five were on your feelings towards Valentines Day (go figure). And ten, yes ten were on monogamy.  

They started off straightforward: 

1. What are your thoughts on having sexual experiences with others with your partner?

a) Not my thing

b) I would be interested in trying

c) That’s a usual Friday for me

Wouldn’t you think that by answering a) I could’ve skipped the next nine questions? Nope, they kept coming, as if they were trying to convince me that ‘usual Fridays’ should consist of sexual experiences between me, my partner, my partner’s friend, an aphid and the ant colony farming it.  

2. Does thinking of your partner with someone else turn you on?

a) No

b) Absolutely

c) I’m not sure, it depends

I wondered about the people who answered c). What might it depend on? Whether their partner was dressed up as a Venus Fly Trap?

3. Would you consider an ethically non-monogamous relationship? 

Yes / No.

4. What are your thoughts on non-monogamous relationships?

a) I don’t understand them

b) I’m curious about them

c) I’ve dabbled in them

5. Do you struggle with monogamy?

Yes / No

6. When in a relationship, do you discuss ground rules around ethical non-monogamy?

By this stage I wouldn’t have been at all surprised if the next question was: Would you be turned on if your partner shoved a banana in someone else’s ear?

I started to wonder if there was something wrong with me for just wanting to be with the one solo single dude. Was I an old fashioned prude for not wanting to screw around? Perhaps I could prove I was a modern day woman by answering yes to ethical non-monogamy, but with the proviso that they constituted my favourite romantasy characters. Like Rhysand – the High Lord of the Night Court; Hunt Athalar – the enslaved fallen angel; Slade Ravenger – the Fae King of Orea… and that Hire a Hubby truck driver with the face that made me want to weep and the exposed muscles I drooled over while stuck in traffic through Brighton. 

As the days passed, and my interaction with the app and its members increased, I started to notice something about myself. I was changing. Instead of switching my brain off on the way in, I was switching to a different mode. Put simply: I became an uncharacteristic bullshitter. And the scariest part? I began to enjoy it!

Is beige actually anyone’s favourite colour? 

Skin-tone beige is my favourite colour.

That’s what I told the guy who tried to extract information from me by asking supposed random unrelated questions as if he wasn’t swimming in a flyblown bowl of suss.  

What month is your birthday? And what date? I want to know what to buy you, he wrote, Tell me what gifts you usually like? 

Blackhead removers. 

When I scrubbed him from my Matches list like an unwanted pustule, he whined, I wanted to keep looking through your photos because you are so beautiful… What’s your mobile number?

I wanted to say, Would you like to know my mum’s maiden name? How about the name of my first pet? While I’m at it, I might as well give you my bank login details. 

A man with the username HandsomeGuy messaged me with what was becoming the hallmark of an introduction d’intelligence: 

Hey. 

I read his profile before deciding whether or not to reply. 

I am handsome, also I am tall, also I like to talk to ladies, also I am well hung, also… 

I thought to myself, Gee this guy sounds like a real big dick.

So I replied (if only to test a theory). I wrote, Hey HandsomeGuy, do you go by any other name?

Dave.

Really? Not Fabio Allcock?

He wrote, What’s your phone number?

I was getting real good at hitting the large X (un-match and delete) which was easily becoming my favourite version of remedial therapy. 

Unfortunately, Dave wasn’t the only man who saw his penis as his most positive attribute. One man answered the question: What’s a hidden secret people don’t know about you? 

I have a dick.

Were there any women using this tactic to attract the opposite sex? Perhaps with the username Diva-With-A-Beaver?

It occurred to me that the dating apps were less about finding the right person and more about steering clear of the wrong ones. 

There were not only multiple dicks to dodge, but contradictory ones too. Like the guy who wrote that he was introverted and easy-going and a libra, then followed up with, I like to meet people, I don’t talk much, but I’m the life of the party. I’m kind and forgiving until someone crosses me and then I become revengeful. 

I thought about correcting him — the word was vengeful, but I resisted, given how stable and level-headed he clearly was. 

All up, my dating app stint lasted about a month. Deleting it from my phone gave me such euphoria that, in retrospect, it was worth the feelings of stupidity while dissecting cupidity. 

I’m telling myself the experience wasn’t a complete failure. It was a masterclass in the detection and deflection of siphoning vectors. By the end, I wasn’t switching my brain off, I was switching it to pinpoint red flags. 

So I’m giving myself a break from the buzzing of transparent wings. The overthinking needs time to settle, or rather, find another direction — like concentrating on a different group of insects. Did you know that antlion larvae dig conical pits to trap their prey? Maybe that’s what I’ve been missing. The right person might just appear someday, like my antlions — one day it was just pot, soil and pansy, then it was pansy and antlion. Perhaps I never needed to seek out Cupid, maybe I just need to wait for my pansy to turn up. Hang on, I think I’ve got that the wrong way around. It doesn’t matter. He can be either pansy or antlion, as long as he doesn’t introduce himself via his penis. He should find non-monogamy as perplexing as I do, and above all, he must be kind. If he happens to be a handyman with a truck licence, all the better.