Speedy Shadchaning

Has anyone else felt a little pressured by their shadchan to make contact with the other party immediately regardless of the expedience for seeing the person any time soon?

I have recently had three shadchanim insist on putting me in immediate contact with the Gentleman, even though I pointed out that I could see him in person in two or three weeks when I was visiting New York.

“So? You’ll talk on the phone.”

Twice? Three times? Before we even meet? It seems a bit unfair to make two people with 2D impressions of each other carry on a conversation-only courtship for two weeks, when, simply by introducing them a week or two later, you could obviate the need.

And then he’s going to suggest a Skype call. I know he will. Guys love webcamming, for some reason. I don’t know why, since they’re generally pretty awful at it.  I’ll put a nice sweater over my pajamas, sweep on some makeup, and spend 15 minutes putzing about with the camera position and lighting. I will look okay. (Nobody actually looks good on a webcam.)  But I know the guy will do none of the above.

I once Google Hung Out with a guy who appeared to use his iPad for the calls. He’d position it on the table below him, providing a foreshortened view of his chest and underchin. The overall impression was that I was communicating with a large sofa cushion topped with a small head. It wasn’t thrilling. But the  turnoff was the way his eyes kept straying off the tablet screen,  above to his desktop screen. I’d never have known he was keeping tabs on his Facebook feed while chatting if we’d just done a phone call.

But webcam tips are for another post. My point is that we didn’t know about each other for the past 27 years of our lives. Will it really hurt so much if we don’t know each other for another two weeks?

While I appreciate a shadchan’s enthusiasm for throwing a promising couple together, I do wish they could rein it in for just long enough to let our calendars swing into sync. So we could avoid multiple cold calls and those horrifying webcam dates. Trust me: this is good for the relationship.

Advertisement

Crushing II

The response to the Crushing post left me curious. I have some questions.

Guys who ditch girls after 2 hours of no first-date sparks: do you find that you “spark” frequently enough that this is a reasonable dating strategy? Like, 75% of the time? 45%? 90%? Or does it not matter, because immediate pyrotechnics are simply mandatory?

Have you never found that a woman “grows” on you? Like, ever?

Girls – hypothetically,  if you used “sparks” as a criteria for second dates, what percentage of your dates would make it to date two? Because I think only 6% of mine would have made it, and one of those guys was a first-class jerk, so make that even less. That would have freed up a great deal of my time, but it also would have thrown out some of the nicest, most promising guys. (Then again, I’m still single, so maybe I should take up this strategy after all.)

A Tale of Two DOA Dates

Not a promising date, but at least the food was good. My date, at least, was an honest, straightforward guy. He knew this was a waste of time, and he was going to put in the bare minimum in terms of time. He didn’t linger over his sandwich, polishing it off and all but licking his fingers as he stared at my half-eaten bagel, daintily nibbled because it was stuffed too much to eat politely on a date.

A silly hang-up, I can’t help but consider in retrospect. I could have stuffed the entire thing down my throat in one go without affecting the outcome of the date (and nor did I want to), so why bother with manners? Breeding, I suppose. (Score one, Mother Dearest.)

“Dessert?” he looked at the questioning waiter, somewhat puzzled. “Oh, no. You don’t want dessert, do you?” he turned to me.

Well, when you put it that way…

Okay, fine. It would not be very nice of me to cadge dessert off a OnD date. But why do I always have to be nice?! The chocolate cake looked really gooey and creamy. I could totally have gone for it.

He got out of the car and walked me to the front walk, gave a shrug, and went to back his car. Mentally dusting off his hands and thinking, “Well, that’s done with.”

“At least I got a bagel out of it,” I summarized to my parents. “No chocolate cake, though. Could really use that chocolate cake now…”

 **************

Not a promising date, but at least the company was good. He was entirely engaged in the conversation, apparently interested in the exchange of ideas. He lingered over his bagel, finishing long after I did. “Are you sure you don’t want anything else? Dessert?” he asked several times. “Let me know if you want anything.” And I was terribly impressed by how naturally he took to gallantry. He didn’t leap forward to grab the door as if recently primed by his mother. He just managed to be in the right place at the right time, and if he wasn’t he let it slide.

“It was very nice meeting you,” he assured me gravely as he dropped me off. “Same here,” I told him quite honestly. Neither of us mentioned meeting again, because we knew it wouldn’t happen.

…but I did sort of wish I knew someone who might work for him. Really, such a decent guy.

Great Link

I love BoSD’s story about a first-first date experience that got a little embarrassing. Remember that first first date? I remember that first first date… I was so self-conscious and worried that I wasn’t doing everything exactly so. My favorite line from the story:

This wasn’t just the first ever date for a girl, but for a family. It is an experience of such magnitude, words can’t do it justice.

Anyway, pop over and enjoy.

PS: this post was auto-scheduled a while ago without proper reference to a calendar, for those of you who found a weird date on your RSS feed and are wondering what was going on there…