Swipe Right/Left/Up/Down and All Around...

A little over a week ago I signed up for an OK Cupid account. That was a mistake. Being unemployed I couldn't afford the “upgrades” which would allow me to see who was “liking” my profile (not sure that I would ever pay for a dating profile anyway), but I did get over a hundred likes in the three days I kept the account open.  I don't know if that's good or not. 

My profile was pretty boring. I had some of my less ogre-ish looking selfies, a picture of me with my son, and a few pictures of me lifting. I was also very forthcoming in my description about my political leanings and motivations for creating a profile. I wanted to meet men or women for friendship, conversation, and that's about it. I miss adult humans.  Or thought I did.  That I'm aware there's not an app that lets you meet people for friendship, or simple conversation. I guess MeetUps come close, but I'm not keen on meeting people right off the bat.  I am probably wrong about the non-existence of a "friendship app," as there does indeed appear to be an app for just about everything. I was also very clear (maybe too clear) that I wasn't interested in random hook-ups, relationships, or anything along those lines. I even mentioned that I am going on five years without sex and wouldn't be upset if I ended up going another five years or more. Of the two men (sadly, no ladies wanted to be friends) who reached out to me, one was incredibly boring. So much so that I thought perhaps he was a Turing Test bot sent by OK Cupid to measure my ability to navigate their product. The other was nice enough, but asked me a little too much about what it's like to go five years without sex. “Fine,” I told him. “I miss intelligent conversation more than I miss sex.” After that he told me he had to take a shower, and then I never heard from him again. I wasn't upset.  The next morning I deactivated my account and deleted the app from my tablet and phone.

Ultimately, I am left wondering why it's so difficult for me to make connections with people. I wasn't hoping for love, but was merely hoping someone would see we had common interests, reach out, and engage me. It didn't happen. My conclusion? I am not very interesting. But I've known this. Even when I was in my prime years (maybe my early twenties) I would not have described myself as interesting. So it's not surprising that my profile failed to elicit a meaningful response of any sort. 

I mean, I've had a pretty shit last few weeks and have heard from none of my flesh and blood friends. A total of three people have contacted me to ask me if I'm OK.  One person has called (someone I've never even met, but love like I've known her for years).  Otherwise, my so-called "real" friends, they couldn't be bothered to give a fuck about how I'm feeling.  Once upon a time I would have been offended and taken their lack of concern as a measure of my value as a human being, now I've simply decided to return the favor and not give a shit about them either.  Sorta.  They're still all people I love and would help if I could, but my sense of urgency might be blunted a bit.  

What my brief OK Cupid experiment has done is gotten me to thinking about the subject of compatibility as a general proposition.  Not just romantic compatibility, but human compatibility.  The last thing I want is a romantic relationship, but I'm fascinated by human relationships, even the romantic kinds. I wish I could sit down with people in relationships/deep friendships and ask them what it is they think makes things work for them. The usual questions don't interest me. Questions like, “How did you meet?” “How long have you been together/been friends?” I guess I'm interested in more abstract things. What keeps people glued to one another for years and years? What makes someone decided to pick up the phone and check in on someone they saw less than twenty-four hours ago?  How do they avoid the usual traps that appear to torpedo most relationships/friendships? What makes someone someone else's “favorite” person? 

I guess I'll never know. 

Anyway. I won't be joining any dating services again. Ever. And that's not a knock on them. My baby sister is engaged to a very nice young man she met on a dating app. She's a Millennial. I think that shit just works better for them.

Tina was right, what's love got to do with it?

Forewarning, this is going to be one of those meandering, personal blogs.  And I'm completely sober (though I have had a lot of coffee).

I am an older single mother.  I'll be 42 in less than six months.  I've essentially lived half of my life without much to show for it in terms of conventional measures of success.  I don't own a home, a car, or have a nest egg of any sort.  I spend a lot of time thinking about this, but this morning I woke up thinking about something I actually never think about:  love.  As in romantic love.  

I am not lonely.  I don't want a relationship or a partner.  In March it will be five years since I had sex with or kissed another human being. (I actually do miss kissing more than I miss intercourse, but that's another post.)  What I was trying to remember was the feeling of being in love with someone.  I was trying to remember the tiny joys.  I've only really been in love, and had that love returned, three times in my life.  Once with a woman, the other two times with men.  All of the relationships ended badly, and one ended badly and also in pregnancy.  Put plainly, I suck at relationships.  Like, really suck at them.  My insecurities played a huge part in ending those relationships, and while I remain insecure, I am less insecure about my looks insofar as I don't give a shit that I'm not, nor have I ever been conventionally attractive.  My insecurities rear their ugly heads on other fronts, like those briefly mentioned at the beginning of this post (i.e. lack of professional and financial security or success).  At my age there aren't many people interested in coupling up with a woman like me.  And that's fine.  I don't blame them.  These days, I don't have much to offer a potential partner.  And I miss friendships more than romantic relationships.  But back to those tiny joys of romantic love.  

I don't remember what it feels like to fall in love, much less be in love, with someone willing to love me back.  I remember that I enjoyed little things like Sunday under the covers, coffee before work, movie nights with a bottle of wine, trips to the grocery store, spontaneous sex, hand holding in public, inside jokes...Otherwise, it all felt like so much work.  I never found the right kind of partner.  While I enjoyed some of those tiny joys, I never found someone with whom I could enjoy a deeper connection.  Someone with whom I could read the same books, engage in deep discussions about the bizarre shit that interests me (politics, music, intersectional feminism, critical race theory, economics, education policy, history, the mystery of consciousness, quantum entanglement, income inequality...sexy shit like that).  There was never that level of connection with my lovers, and often barely with any of my friends.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not above weekend marathons of Top Chef or Project Runway (when I'm unemployed, I'm really good at these), but I like to sprinkle my mind trash with the occasional cerebral jolt, you feel me?  Not because I think I'm better than anyone, but because it really is the kind of thing I enjoy.  I guess what I'm saying is that I always wanted to fall in love with someone's mind, and have them fall in love with my mind seeing as how my physical offerings were never going to leave them gasping.  It never happened.  I never found that man/woman.  And now, I'm almost beyond giving a shit.  I'm too old to care about falling in love.  I don't have the liberty of trying.  I have a child I can't support, but must try and support anyway.  Oh yes, there's my child to include in the new calculus.  What man/woman would want to be with a woman (like me) who has a child?  Again, none that I've known.   

A different version of me would have found this all very depressing.  Today's version thinks it is what it is.  You get old.  You become even more unattractive.  And you fail to impress the world.  You also forget what it ever felt like to be in love.   

Back...AGAIN!

Six years is a long time. 

I want to blog again.  No, I need to blog again.  And here's why:  I don't have anything else to do!  And I remember feeling that words were important to me, that it was important for me to write, express myself, and take the time to examine the world around me.  I'd like to explore that feeling again.

Let's recount some of the things which have happened in the six years since I've written anything for this space.  

• I had a child.  
• I left my child's father after deciding he would be bad for us (he drank a LOT). 
• After that relationship ended, I returned to the States from Korea and remained unemployed for four years.  
• I finished a master's degree which was funded by one of the kindest humans on the planet. 
• I found a job.  Granted, it was only a part-time job, but the market for newly minted librarians in this part of the world isn't great.  In fact, it sucks.  For a lot of reasons.   
• I was fired from that job after less than four months, and told nothing other than, "you're not the right person for this job."  It's done.  I don't want to dwell on it, because ultimately, I don't give a shit insofar as it can't be undone.  Does it mar my ability to find another job...oh yeah.  So, I am unemployed again.
• Unemployment is why I am considering another return to Asia.  China this time, possibly as a librarian, but more than likely as an English teacher...again.  

Until then, there are thoughts to be thought, ideas to be explored, and because all I have is time, why not use some of that time to write about the things that interest me, even though I'm actually not a very interesting person.  That's not a knock.  Seriously.  It's just me telling it like it is.  I have interests, just like any other person, but they're not very original.  For example, I am interested in:  

• Powerlifting
• Quantum physics 
• Economics 
• Public policy 
• Education policy 
• Information literacy 
• Art 
• Identity 
• Addressing inequality of access to quality information, healthcare, education, infrastructure, food...this list could go on and on.  
• Social Justice

These are just a few things that interest me, but like I said, I myself am not very interesting.  I had thought that becoming a librarian would be a prime opportunity to advocate for the things which interest me, things about which I am passionate, but I am fairly certain I was wrong about that.  Librarians aren't social justice actors.  I don't know that librarians see themselves capable of effecting such change.  Many of them are terrified of the idea that their profession might be good for anything other than story times, readers' advisory, or circulation.  Librarians aren't great innovators.  What's more, many librarians are constrained by politics or ideology and can't be more than babysitters anyway.  Librarians aren't capable of a creative destruction that could transform the profession for the better when there are stakeholders (council members, deans, and citizens) to whom they must answer.  Pissing people off isn't an option.  So maybe I don't care about librarianship so much as it is information that I care more deeply about, especially if it means getting information to at-risk communities for whom the right information has real-life consequences.  As a queer woman of color and single mother, this is more important to me than the title of librarian.  After all, librarianship remains an incredibly white profession; therefore, would I ever be able to find my way, be comfortable, or be fully accepted?  In my short-lived job I felt invisible to the white patrons.  A few of them had a look of skepticism that I could be an actual librarian.  Me?  The only black-ish, non-white person on the staff?  How could that be so?  After all, I didn't look like a librarian.  

And that's true.  I don't look like a librarian because not many librarians look like me.  So, rather than try and make myself feel comfortable in a profession whose demographics exclude me from acceptance, I am going to hold on to the tenets of the profession which I believe can serve my larger visions and beliefs.  True, I'm not feeling very empowered right now as an unemployed single mother, but I'm going to hold on to librarianship's tenets of intellectual freedom, inquiry, and access, and somehow use my education to advocate for information's power to transform the lives of people like me.