Dating Profile
Dear Rex Robusto,
My dating profile is striking out on every site on the Internet!
I can’t get any hits, can’t make any matches, can’t find any takers.
There is no good reason for why I’m failing so badly.
Will you take a look at what I’ve written for my online persona?
Please offer me some answers:
At this point, I usually add more images of myself, just to help break up the text. Photos of me at the beach, or in front of my 84-inch widescreen with 5K, or that time I dressed up in medical scrubs and a sexy bow tie for Halloween and told everyone I was “Dr. Feelgood.”
But dawg those aren’t the problem, we know that!
It’s got to be the words, I just think I’m writing above their level:
Nothing more to say, is there?
Let me know what you think!
Signed,
Liaisons Offer Very Erotic Relationships
Dear LOVER,
While I’m no expert on the etiquette of Internet l’amour, I do have thoughts to share.
But before we zoom in on the details of modern love? Let’s first zoom out!
I feel like thinking big. In fact, I’ll turn to possibly the biggest thing on the planet: the ocean.
When I envision the ocean, what do I imagine?
Crashing waves and pounding surf. Swift currents. Stormy seas. Dark and foreboding depths brimming with unique, unheralded creatures.
A perfect metaphor for the online realm of love and loss.
And yet no one ever refers to a match-up site as the “dating ocean.”
If anything, it’s colloquially known as the “dating pool.”
Perhaps the ocean, with its trenches and tidal waves and tiger sharks, was far too intense of a comparison.
And so we wade into the dating pool, merely hoping that the water’s not too cold, not too green, not too scummy.
Except for you, my new friend!
You’ve cannonballed straight into the deep end, jumping in with reckless and unhinged abandon.
Do you really expect to find a partner this way?
Any potential paramour with even borderline literacy skills would be repelled by your words and attitudes.
Your dare-I-say sophomoric effort makes me think this: you are afraid of real love. Afraid of being hurt. Thus, you minimize your own beating heart.
There is only one course of action.
Take down your current dating profile.
This pool is closed for cleaning and repairs.
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You need to go back to the beginning.
Seek out what feels sincere, what offers hope, what gives your heart a yearning and yet fear all at once.
Everything starts with you.
Put on your finest flippers, let go of the surface, and swim unbroken through a new ocean of love.
REX
Counterpoint commentary by …
Shandoleesa, Mistress of the Trapeze
I will not indulge in this foolishness for one minute longer.
Your misadventures as a blowhardio lothario are laughably inconsequential.
There are much more important matters to discuss.
One thing, though, is true.
Life contains many types of pools that you could be surprised to suddenly occupy.
I’ve recently taken residence in one. It’s known as the High-Risk pool.
That’s to be expected, they tell me. In my particular line of work.
As regular readers of this column (or hardcore circus fans) know, I am the only major trapeze artist regularly performing without a net.
Until today.
The insurance company tells us they will no longer indemnify me or the Zaboni Brothers Traveling Circus in the event of catastrophic injury. Not unless I abandon my “high-risk” behavior.
High-risk?
Not in my expert opinion. I have complete faith in my talents.
And because of it?
I’m a showstopper.
I’m a star.
But without insurance approval? There is no act, there is no performance. The circuses’ lawyers made that very clear. Even that one attorney who stammers and blushes every time I make direct eye contact.
I simply have no choice.
My days as a unicorn are forever over.
The actuaries and their probability tables are somehow more compelling than a courageous, gorgeous, daredevil aerialist.
We live in interesting times.
I put on a show unlike any on Earth.
Somehow … that is not enough.
Regardless of any waivers or notarized acknowledgements I might make.
Leaving me resigned to meaningless triple somersaults above taut netting that ensures my complete and total safety.
For now, I will perform within the bounds of corporate society.
But nothing can hold me forever.
I am a showstopper.
I am a star.
My need to soar ever higher — with only Icarus wings at my back — is something that can never be quelched.
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