When a plane crashes, it’s rarely just one thing that went wrong. It’s usually a lot of little things, little mistakes that lead to tragedy. A tiny part was faulty, this switch got turned off, that instrument was read wrong, etc. It’s the same with the Titanic. A raging fire weakened a bulkhead that was the last line of defense. The steel used for the rivets gets brittle in salt water. The ice berg sideswiped the ship, tearing into the rivets and hull just enough to flood enough compartments and overtop the bulkheads. Had the ship hit the ice berg head on she probably would not have sunk. If there were enough life boats. If the ship the California that was very close to the Titanic hadn’t turned off it’s wireless communications for the night. And so on.
I’m struggling with how, or even if I need to explain why I started online dating again, especially so soon after I said I was mostly done with it. You can probably surmise from the first paragraph that it was a lot of little things.
As you may recall I’m still on Match. I reactivated my Plenty of Fish account after hiding my profile for a month. It has the most free features. I already paid for Match and wasted money on other sites so I’m not going to pay for any more. And I started a Tinder account. I know what you’re thinking… “really Robbye? Why?” It’s not just for sex anymore. It evolved into a dating app a few years ago. I know of people that met on Tinder who are in happy, healthy relationships. So far it’s not been any different from the other sites. I didn’t really expect it to be.
I’ve had 3 mutual matches on Tinder so far, and only one who I’ve actually exchanged messages with. I was hopeful about him even though he lives in Sierra Vista which is about 65 miles south of Tucson, and he’s 42. We had chatted a little and then I asked him if we actually could go out, what would be a typical Saturday night for him (dating during the Coronavirus is an entirely different thing, I’ll elaborate another time). He said movies at home with his kids, he has them full time. Uh, no. I need someone I can go out dancing with, whenever it is we can do that again. It’s bad enough he’s more than an hour away.
I started chatting with a man on Plenty of Fish. He’s really cute. He works out and it shows if you know what I mean (insert winking emoji here). The chats haven’t been scintillating thus far, but his grammar and spelling are good so there’s that. We’ll see if we get to a phone call stage.
And finally, the reason for the title of this post is because of a former baseball pitcher I met. I started chatting with a man from Match. Cute and really positive in his description of himself in his profile. We didn’t chat very long before he gave me his phone number. Usually a phone number given that quickly is a scammer. I didn’t think he was – his chats matched his profile, no bad grammar, etc. – but it threw me a little. I responded a day later that I’m not super comfortable giving my number to someone I just started chatting with, which is true BTW. A woman can’t be too careful. He said he understood. He gave me his last name and told me to Google him. So I did.
He pitched in minor and Major League Baseball for 10 years, then coached for another 30. He’s from Tucson. His birthday is towards the end of September which is good for me (you’ll understand when I tell you about my two ex-husbands). In his profile he says he’s open to all opinions without saying which way he leans. That’s almost always a conservative. As I later learned, that indeed is the case with The Pitcher. We chatted a few more days. Last night I finally just called him.
First off, I like his voice which is good. A voice I don’t like is usually a killer. It’s not an automatic deal breaker though. Often people sound a little different in person than they do on the phone. He didn’t sound nearly as upbeat and positive as he did in his profile description, but I don’t know him and that was a snap judgment. I still liked (not loved, but liked) his voice. At first we had a decent conversation. Nice to finally talk to you, sorry your dad had dementia, sorry my dad has Alzheimers, how many siblings, etc. It was a good back and forth. For a few minutes. Then it turned into a Desert Dave (the first one) type “conversation” except with a conservative instead of someone I agree with.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I have no problem with sane conservatives. I do have a problem with current MAGA hat wearing trump fans. If you still support him, we don’t have the same values. Anyhow, our conversation rapidly turned into 10 minutes of The Pitcher giving me his opinion on the Coronavirus – he thinks the media has overblown it. He says it’s worse in California and New York, and he doesn’t want to say the blue states deserve it, but they do. He hates California for reasons known only to unhinged conservatives. If you don’t like Cali, don’t live there. Otherwise, why do they care so much? And on and on. I started to just tune him out. I finally told him “you know I’m a liberal, right?” (If he read my profile he knows I’m a Democrat). As a matter of fact, some of his best friends are liberals and he accepts them anyway. Isn’t that big of him. He had been talking so long, towards the end of the conversation I was surprised to hear my own voice. I ended the call shortly thereafter.
What surprised me is that it was his chance to impress me, show me he’s a thoughtful man and interested in me. Instead, I get a 10 minute diatribe in a voice that never got any more upbeat. Why on Earth would he just straight up insult me by bashing liberals?
He apparently did not feel the same about our conversation. I’m sure from his point of view it went great – he did all the talking. He sent me a “have a nice day” message this morning. Then he sent me this emoji 🥰 on Match. Lord have mercy. I’m thinking I might give him one more chance at a conversation. Perhaps I’ll explain the problems I had with our first conversation. Maybe I caught him in an unusual mood. Maybe he doesn’t even realize he monopolized the conversation and would be more conscious of it. Maybe that’s who he really is. But do I really want someone who would straight up disregard me like that? No, no I don’t. I’ll let you know what I decide.