Mistaken Identity

This post was originally written back in October 2007 but was posted on July 8, 2008.

This is a very funny story, but in order to tell it I have to admit something about myself of which I am not proud. I have been internet dating.

I know, I know, everyone's doing it these days. I had decided it just wasn't for me. A few months ago I played in a golf outing with my friend and we were paired up with two great girls, both of whom met their current boyfriends on the internet. So I thought I'd open myself up to the opportunity. Again.

Now I could write a book about some of the initial contacts I get. The latest was "your pretty". That's all it said. Right next to it was a picture of Bubba sitting in a hot tub grinning. I wanted to respond to him, "My pretty what?" I may not get a date but I sure get entertained. I deleted poor Bubba.

Recently I got an email from a nice respectable young man who's probably too young for me but he's smart, a hard worker and somewhat impressive. I thought I would humor him and maybe encourage him a little bit. At the very least I could perhaps build his ego up so he would have confidence for the next girl who might be right for him. So I emailed him back thanks for his interest in me, etc. A few days later I got an email from him. There was my picture beside the email so I know he was looking at it while he was writing. He started out talking about me, complimenting me. Things were going just fine until I got to the next paragraph.

That's when he started telling me he liked the way I had talked about us snuggling (huh?) and cuddling (what??) and cooking dinner (me???) together on New Year's Eve. I barely cook on regular days, much less holidays.
I stopped reading.....What???
I read it again. It got more descriptive. More physical. More graphic.
I would NEVER talk that way with a man after one email!! I wouldn't talk that way after one date! He was responding to some other girl's email smack dab in the middle of mine! And it wasn't just a brief mention of what she'd said. There was a long paragraph dedicated to her suggestions of what she'd like to be doing with him on New Year's Eve. I don't know what she said but he liked it and I could tell he was very excited about it. To his credit he seemed to have enough sense to be a little cautious about a woman who was being so forward, but you could tell he was also very optimistic.

After I got over my initial shock all I could think was, "hmmm......Is THIS how women get men interested? Talk about physical stuff right away??" And then I had to laugh at myself. Here I was reading this email to another girl and I was taking a lesson from it. I guess it might have hurt if I had been dating the guy for a while, but under the circumstances I thought it was funny.

I wrote him back. I told him I didn't know who he was talking to but she must have written one heck of an email. I never heard from him again but I'm flattered he liked my face so much that he accidentally stuck someone else's personality into it.