#ICurseAlot

I’m trying to figure out the most compelling topic for a first email and all I can think of is that “I spent $5K on a matchmaker.”  I don’t believe in writer’s block but I also don’t mind writing something shitty.  Well that’s not true at all. I’m actually super super conscious of what you think of me, but if this sucks I don’t have to send it.  Also,  I know if I start to write usually I will continue.  Would that I did that with exercising too! I’d have an ass you could bounce a quarter on.  Is that phrase misogynistic? I guess not when you’re talking about yourself.

So since I clearly can’t get past this. Don’t waste your money on it! It was a bad decision and put me in some financial stress because that money would have come in handy for something else.  Almost anything else. Also, since I’ve dated half of Manhattan already  (Jewish Manhattan really). This was more a desperate act to thrust some distance between me and my Covid life (and being podded with my then 2.5 year old and my parents for almost two years).  

Like everyone during Covid, I was lonely, had put on 12 lbs, which on me looks and feels like 25 and had lost my fucking mind at least twice.   But stopped eating carbs and was down a whopping 137.5 exactly.  Again, that looks and feels like 125 on something my build.  So I felt good enough to get naked in front of someone besides my daughter and my dog, if the matter arose (get it – booo). 

I was scrolling through FaceBook…like it was my job…and saw a post that one of the matchmakers I am connected with, was looking for women…I’m a woman! It was an easy sell. To back up for a second, I’ve worked with matchmakers many times before.  When I was in my 30’s and (truthfully) hotter and thinner, I used to get approached to be the dates of men who had hired matchmakers, NEVER thinking I would be a hire-er.  So I was a bit familiar with the structure as the ‘entertainment’ for the evening of a match date. I wasn’t obliged to fuck anyone, nor did I, not that it’s any of your business, but I do think if I’ve been asked out on a date and I say yes, it’s just polite to be polite and engaged in said date, even if the gentleman is clearly not 50 but 70 and those big striking eyes I was told about are big because one is lazy.  #FALSEADVERTISING 

But who am I kidding?  I’ve done it too. Still do really.  The only reason I actually know my own age at this point is because I had to tell my birthdate when I got my colonoscopy this year.  Also, I’m not that far gone into motherhood brain fog or am I.  

 

So I was scrolling through facebook and one of them asked if I wanted to chat.  Honestly I thought she was approaching me to the be datee but I had clearly crossed into another demographic becaus this time I was the dater and now in the pay to play stages of my life. Sigh. 

 

I firmly said no but agreed to have a follow up call after I thought about it a bit and quickly forgot about the conversation.  I’m sure I even joked with one of my besties about the pay to play thing. 

And then a week later the follow up call came.  Damn cell phones.  I was not having a good day and had gone into the empty office of the Hedge Fund I was working at, as I was doing once a week, to get the mail and have some human interaction with the one trader who was also going into the office.  This was before I got my glorious e scooter, and given the lack of privacy or quiet time, I walked home from Midtown east.  My phone rang when I was at 7th avenue and 56th, debating if I wanted to stop into TJ Maxx.  I answered it, randomly, and it was the matchmaker. I was halfway in tears of where my life was when she called and she gave a great soft, hard sell about how this would be different than the hundreds of dates I had gone on, when I was on the apps so I gave her my credit card and $5K later, I was a client. 

 

Spoiler alert.  It was literally no different.  They promised they would introduce me to men with the boxes I required, and no they could not create chemistry so that was the disclosure in the fine print.  And boy did they lean into that one.  

I was guaranteed three dates in three months with potentially two bonus dates if they popped up.  I will not bore you with the details of each mediocre date or you’ll be reading this for fucking hours. But they were FINE.  Fine is exactly what they all were.  The right height, the objectively attractive, the right successful and ambitious, the right vintage and the right intellectual level.  

 

For the highlight reel, one wasn’t interested in me any more than I was interested in him.  One was socially awkward and nice but not going to happen.  And one had me split the tab on the bar food we had ordered on our second date. This last point is tricky because some people (including my matchmaker)  think this is old fashioned or sexist and that when first dating people should pay for their own meal, drink blah blah.  I am not one of those people.  After spending my relationship being the one who focused on making a living (not in my “preferred” profession) so we could have health insurance while he “only ever made money as an artist” (see the first point as to how that happened)  I was done picking up the check on the first or second date. I am happy to pay, ask any of my friends.  Regardless of the $5K, I can pay for my own meal or drink, I actually enjoy picking up the tab sometimes with friends just because it’s nice and makes me feel good about myself.  But it’s one of my dating tests and he failed.  So now I was out $5K plus $38 but we had french fries so…

 

When I got home I was seething.  You know, when you pay for something that you’re used to getting for free, expecting to get something different and you don’t, it’s fucking enfuriating. That said, it’s my fault really. I knew this going in.  But I so wanted to believe there was something else, that I wasn’t doing that perhaps that a professional could help me do.  Have you done this before? 

 

Like find me that guy on the white horse who was going to swoop in and take over the heavy lifting of all the masks and diapers and the care and feeding of my kiddo and my parents.  Someone who would buy me a new pair of Manolos FFS! Just because he thought I’d like them.  

 

But there’s no white horse, and no one is going to come in and take over.  No matter how much money I throw at the problem.  And at this point I’m sure you’ve figured out, it’s not the first time I’ve thrown money at a problem.  (Sometimes that works, you know!).  But not this way. And I think about …it a lot.  I enjoy being a single mom a lot.  And sometimes it fucking sucks but as any married person will tell you. There’s no perfect relationship and being in a marriage takes a lot of work too.  Would I be fine if a handsome, rich, smart, creative and funny guy showed up at my door carrying purple peep-toe slingbacks and a massage table.  Of course, but it ain’t going to happen. Not like that.  Not for me.  I am too picky, too independent and too happy with the first two, to sacrifice too much. 

 

And if I’m being honest, I have a nice memory of two men, specifically, who checked most of my boxes in the last ten years, who I sometimes think would have come quite close to that whole purple peep-toe fantasy.  Alas, not today Carole.  Not today.   But I’m still holding out.  

 

In the end, losing the $5 grand is on me.  I know I’m lucky to have had it to spend.  But ultimately I’m responsible for my own decisions, actions and if something isn’t going the way I think it should, I have to take accountability.  However much is my own doing.  Adulting is fucking exhausting, huh?  

 

I hope you haven’t had to do too much of it today. 

 

And with that, I give you your eyeballs back so you can go scroll or shop, or work etc. 

 

If you have any thoughts, feel free to comment.  But let’s not be assholes if you don’t agree with someone else, or me, I’m good with that, but please don’t be a jerk about it.  TYIA. 

 

Also, I’ve linked a few things here if you’re interested in checking them out. 

And if you’re getting this and you’re like WTF, who are you and how did I get on this stupid list, you can unsubscribe below.  

OR if you think someone else will relate, please forward or add them to my mailing list (with their permission of course) HERE. 

 

Here’s your chance.

Muah! 

Carole