It doesn’t matter. I did it. It’s a step!

This is what happened to me a few weeks ago. I had met a man online and he seemed really lovely. I had told him I wasn’t particularly looking for anything serious. I think online is a great way to meet new people and most people I talk to agree with me on that one. It isn’t necessarily about finding The One or settling down. It is a chance to hook up with some new people and see what you think. However, this is more difficult than it sounds. I am a woman of my generation. I am 47 years old and have been a serial monogamist all of my life. I am not used to dating. I am used to meeting someone and then it moving on in to something else or not. This concept of dating here and dating there and keeping everything light and open and breezy is quite difficult for me. It’s as if the world has been re-drawn, re-mapped and I am not quite sure what form it has taken. I am not alone in feeling this way. Most of the men I meet online feel the same way too.

However, we are all trying to negotiate a new way of being, of communicating. Online communication can be quite intimate quite quickly. This man and myself very rapidly built up a rapport. There was lots of ‘let’s meet now!’ from him. I was more reticent. I wanted to wait and see. But then you wait and the communication starts to feel a bit false and then it all begins to get less and less frequent so…being aware of these pitfalls, we arranged to meet. He asked me out for dinner and, as I thought we would get on well, I agreed.

Now comes the tricky part; what were our expectations of each other? This was hard to quantify. We had become ‘close’ online but never actually met. Would we be like our online persona?

Thankfully, he looked like his online photo so no shock there. And we had a lovely evening. We got on well, chatted away. We both admitted we were nervous. At the end of the evening, we hugged goodbye and he said, “well, I’m not sure where we go from here so let’s keep in touch.”

I felt utterly deflated. It didn’t seem like a ringing endorsement to me!

So. What do we do now? I don’t know. I have thought long and hard about this and this is what I need to say for my final blog; it is a new world. None of us quite know what to expect. We all carry baggage. We all want to meet someone but then, maybe, we don’t really know how to handle it.

We need to kiss many frogs I think but we also need to have endurance. Life isn’t like it was in our 20s when we were free and easy and met people through work and friends. We have to travel further distances. We have to put ourselves out there and that makes us vulnerable. So, how do I read this ‘date’?

The best thing to stick to is, I had a good time. I met a lovely and kind man. I wasn’t for him. Maybe he wasn’t for me. Maybe we will see each other again. It doesn’t matter. I did it. It’s a step!

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