Looking For Love, Or At Least A Date
By Annie Goodman
Single, white female seeking a single male companion. Must be educated, enjoy your career, trustworthy, seeking adventure, close to your family (not necessarily in proximity) and looking forward to starting your own one day. Men of all colors, shapes and sizes are welcome. Smokers need not apply. Divorced with kids: been there; done that. Serial daters aren’t welcome, and if you just got out of a relationship, please don’t waste my time.
Growing up, I always envisioned being married with kids by the age of 30, but little did I know that God had a different plan for me, though it’s not for lack of trying. The one guy I was completely head over heels for in high school got back together with his on-again-off-again girlfriend, and I was left in the dust. To this day, when I pass him on the road, I still wonder what life would be like if we would have been high school sweethearts. Moving on…at least I usually do. Sigh.
During my junior year of college, I met someone special, but after dating for five months (yes, five!), a good friend of mine saw him kissing a girl — who wasn’t me — at a frat party.
Then, I thought I might have met “the one” in my senior year of college. But after five years of an on-and-off relationship, I opted to get off the merry-go-round of misery, even though it broke my heart. I’d like to believe that disappointment was just God saying, “Be patient, I have something (you mean someone, right, God?) better for you.”
I live in a small town in Southern Indiana and know pretty much everyone, which makes it difficult to meet new guys, especially those who haven’t already dated my friends or might somehow be distantly related.
I have been set up with friends of friends — and friends of their friends — dated guys from my workplace and even gone out with guys I’ve met while out ‘n’ about. Still, nothing, which is why I’m now trying online dating. Desperate times call for desperate measures, my friends. Or maybe this is just an evolution in dating that I need to embrace.
Forget the days of actually calling someone on the phone and “courting” them (does anyone do that anymore?). Nowadays, it’s all about scrolling down, clicking on a profile, swiping left, swiping right, delete. It seems messaging, chatting, Tweeting, Facebooking and texting have become the go-tos for communication, and emoticons are about as romantic as it will get.
But I want more.
I want to have awkward dates and uncomfortable conversation as we try to get to know each other without having Google help us out.
I want to know how he spends his time by spending time with him — whoever he is — instead of finding out via his Instagram account.
I want…so much. Is it out there? Is he? This single gal in Southern Indiana is going to find out.
Read more about Annie Goodman in the next issue of Extol and at ExtolMag.com.
