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okrox -> RE: In Praise of Casual Dating (7/1/2008 6:51:48 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: iwillfearnoevil
quote:
ORIGINAL: okrox
Maybe I shouldn't call these "dates" then. Maybe just "meet-n-greets?"
it's a fine line okrox ... i wondered about the pity angle ... it seems like a good idea but how would one approach someone ... 'i want to be your friend but have zero romantic interest, do you want to go to dinner?' ... it seems like if you are going on group activities with someone like this it could be more natural ...
Maybe this is where some of the confusion comes from...I am not saying I have gone out with men I have NO interest in...no, no, no. I have never done that. I am only saying I go out with men that I don't know yet whether or not I have interest in. Big difference. EVery man I've gone out with this last year has had enough selling points (professes Christianity, employed, clean and polite) that I was willing to give him a chance.
And, sorry, John, but I think there is a big difference to the two hiring processes I used in my analogy above. One zeros in on only one possibility with high hopes and a high front-end investment. That makes it very difficult to see a person objectively. The more time you have invested, the more likely you are to convince yourself you've made the right choice to justify it--even if you have to wiggle reality a little. This is very common in dating.
The second method gives as many candidates as possible a chance to be evaluated earlier in the process. Knowing this isn't the only candidate makes it a little easier to be objective.
However, John, you do have a very valid point about wasting time. You are in a little different situation than most of us. Not only are you a single parent, but you have no every-other-weekend-alone like a lot of us do. I do think that makes your case unique. I would be a little less "Oh, why not?"-ish myself if I had to weigh it against time with my kids.
One other reason I like to "meet-n-greet"--When I meet men online (I live in a rural area. There's not much other way to do it.) I realize that not everyone has the same strengths. I've met men who are fabulous at e-mail, not good on the phone. Or great on the phone, but the in-person was not a good fit. Since I don't intend to spend my married life only e-mailing and phoning it in, I think the in-person meeting is very important ASAP.
In fact, the current Person Of Interest was not very interesting in e-mails, (nice, but not exactly Mr. Personality) only slightly more on the phone, but terrifically good company in real life. So how would I have known had I not agreed to that first casual date? (Even his picture was so-so, and in person, he's NOT! Lucky for me. He would have been too busy to answer my e-mails in the first place, if the other women had known how cute he really is!)
Is it a date or not? Well, every one of them has said something like, "I'd like to buy you coffee" or "Will you let me take you to dinner?" or something like that, so, I've thought of them as dates. ? And, please don't think I was just out to get a free dinner. I was very open about the fact that it would be a very casual date, with no expectations on either side. That seemed just fine to everyone.
So...you tell me... am I being a player? (HA! Never in a million years would I have thought of even asking that question! That's very very funny, if you knew me.)
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