Saturday, April 4, 2015

Dear Cupid, please help.

Wow, it's been a long time since I've been here and a long time since I've felt like I had the space and desire to write a blog post. Frankly, I'm not sure I'm there yet but I figured why not give it a shot.

These days when people ask how I am or how it's going I usually answer with a vague "Oh, you know, life". This is not because I don't want to share or don't believe that someone else would get it because I know that others go through issues like these. It's more because I feel like I'm walking a delicate line of being able to keep functioning and if I unpack that baggage right now the dam might break and I wouldn't be able to keep acting like I was mostly ok.

I am still very lucky - one of those things that keeps me going - and the good people still around me in life are what make me feel like I'll actually come out the other side even if I don't know when. I'm just tired. Tired of feeling sad and feeling like I can't actually take things turning around at face value because for about a year now each upswing has been rather promptly halted and sent crashing back to the ground.

Ok, topic change!

What I actually wanted to post about was another observation about online dating. First, let me say that I was inspired to think about the weirdness of dating again because of a good friend's new blog call Tin Foil Knights - always a fun read.  Back to it, there is a newer development that I don't quite understand - not sure that I don't like it but it begs an explanation. I am 31, I'm confident and find myself beautiful, know that as a thick chick I may have a niche audience but frankly it's not a narrow field so please don't read the next as a veiled self consciousness.

Why do more 21 year olds want to talk to me more than men my age or older?? 21 is very young on so many levels. I have a few theories:

  1. There is something inherently wrong with men in my generation - ok, ok, this isn't a new theory but it has yet to be debunked
  2. These 21 year old youngins grew up with the concept of cougars as commonplace and have somehow translated that to think it's normal
  3. 21 years olds these days are just overall smarter and clearly like a better caliber of women (remember how I said I don't lack self confidence)
None of the above stops my gut reaction to a 21 year old asking if I want to hang out from being "No, I'm sorry I can't babysit that night".  There has been so much change between 21 year old me and 31 year old me not to mention my taste in men - while not amazing now it has definitely improved!

In case you were wondering about what my niche is, and it changes periodically, currently it appears to be a relatively balanced mix of older men with children (who on the whole seem nice if not a little beat down by life), polyamorous men (so many polyamorous men), and children (aka 21 year olds).

Dear cupid, please help.

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