So Many Connections

By RLK

Personal computers, the internet, cellphones, smart phones, apps, virtual reality and now, near total physical isolation. 

In these times of social distancing I take a walk down memory lane. Youtube algorithms suggest I’d like to watch old episodes of “Love Connection,” and they're right. 

Growing up in a household with a single mother, this particular type of programming was a weekly event for us. Regular children’s shows, with puppets and song, were too slow and untethered to reality. After my parent’s separation, although they remained friends, I knew my mom was interested in new romance. I loved fairy tales and I think she did too, so we were basically taking turns reading from the same book. 

“Love Connection,” hosted by Chuck Woolery, (years 1983-1994,) was a perfect dramatic half hour piece of gossip. It was a dating show “where old-fashioned romance meets modern-day technology.” The “technology” of what the 1980s was referring to, was being able to view your potential match from pre recorded video profiles. Once you, the featured single, selected someone out of the three choices, you’d get to go on an all-expenses paid date of your choosing, and come back the following week with a report full of all the salacious details.

The show had to fit a 30-minute time slot, therefore all the contestants' hopes, dreams and fears necessarily had to boil down to a few easy sound bites. Everybody got a little intro, “She’s a 26 year old accountant, who considers herself a go-getter, wants someone who is well-read and has big hands. Let’s meet Andrea...” I loved the outfits, hairstyles, and the Picasso-esque quality of taking disjointed features and putting them together creating a masterpiece of a fantasy. 

“This attorney never argues on dates, considers himself a “leg-man” and doesn’t like a woman who’s too smart. Let’s meet Roger...” It is raw and real and honest and embarrassing. And yes, at times “offensive.” 

All comical to me now, however, my child’s mind sort of served as the syringe for the drug that was human sexuality. Depictions of romance flowed seamlessly into my psyche without resistance or questioning. When the program wasn’t on, I would “play barbies” having them take turns going on rollerblading dates with my lone Ken doll. Each date was fun -- full of screwball mishaps -- like tripping and going flying into the ocean -- ahhhh! or a giant cat walks through the scene and sits on everyone. Only one lucky barbie would find true romance and live happily ever after, and then the game would be over, just like the show.

But not many can say, that, outside of Hollywood and make-believe, a version of the dating game was actually alive in their living room. Before there were dating apps or matchmaking sites, there was the back page of the weekly paper called the “personals.” When I started elementary school, my mom put out a call for love, in an ad of her own. 

“Read the New Yorker in bed with me…ISO (in search of) LTR (long term relationship) NS (non-smoking) HWP (height/weight proportionate).” Each single got five lines to express themselves, (hence the abbreviations,) and anything beyond that you paid extra -- either implying you were wealthy or desperate. No photos.

Something that might spark her interest would be, “Outdoors/recent New York-transplant…looking for laughs, a good time, and nice conversation” but if a man used "nice-lady" he was out. 

Eyes narrowed, "I don't want to be ‘nice' and I'm not a ‘lady,'” she'd hiss. “Oh, I hate when they say ‘petite,’ or ‘slim and fit’ - yeah you and the next guy, buddy -- gawwwwwd" she'd talk to the paper. Very analogue.

The word restriction made it interesting, we were looking just as much for what was said, as for what wasn’t. First, she would go down each column, me perched over her shoulder, thoroughly circling and crossing out the dregs of Seattle's singles. Then I, preferably with a different colored pen, would come in to do the final edits: exclamations, hearts, stars, and angry faces.

If one was a winner, she’d call the hotline, punch in the ad’s personal code, and then leave a private message. “Hi ‘Just back from Catalina’ I like your profile, I’m located north of the city, want to meet for a walk around the lake?” I know it sounds totally terrifying and impractical but it actually worked -- at least a few times! 

From the moment the message was left, the tension began to build. “If he doesn't call by Wednesday for a weekend date – then I'll just have to say I'm busy and we'll have to do it some other time.” Words of wisdom from a veteran dater. 

“Give 'em an inch and they'll take a mile. You can't let a man think you're too available -- it smacks of desperation.” I’d hear recitations of this harsh yet priceless truth and other choice rhetoric from the dating bible, “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.” And If you just follow the rules, it all sounded pretty easy. (Later, when I started dating, I would scream at her for bringing these maxims up but with the secret fear that she was right, always lurking.)

Mom dated on and off for years, and when the paper was upgraded to online services, the game became more addicting. Eyes now glued to a computer screen, I imagined her deep red hair spun up like cotton candy, a cigarette dangling from her mouth, pulling the arm of a slot machine, waiting to hit it big - but with the intensity of a big haul driver. Although her skill became more refined when excavating gems from the rubble, she was also more "open minded and non-judgmental" which led to lousy dates with tax attorneys and former priests. 

Actual date night was equally exciting. She’d step out of the shower to begin her getting-ready ritual, and I’d take my post at the doorway to keep her company.  “I've always had great legs –- but this damn pooch won't leave me alone!" Standing naked in front of the mirror, she’d tug at her stomach cursing its existence. 

Then her lips would form into a perfect pout and a little smile, invoking her fantasy look-alike, Juliette Binoche, chin high, eyes downcast, and for a moment she’d escape her common surroundings and me. Then, as if her own mother clapped her hands in her face, she looked down once more, "I am so fat." 

We keep moving. She’s starting to run late and will never truly appreciate her own beauty. 

I pass her the hairdryer. We must catch all the hair while it's still wet or else it will dry flat to her head, the opposite of big hair, and big hair is sexy. She’d tip herself over the bathtub to dry it upside down for maximum loft, and to catch any stray hairs that fell during this tense process. 

When the hair is dry and still warm, she’d swiftly grab chunks combing it backwards preparing for the worst: losing its shape. Then snatching her bathrobe, she’d sprint to the back porch and throw open the glass door. The cool air acts as a setting agent, the hair standing straight on end fighting to wilt. I watch her wait outside: pale, vulnerable, no makeup, in only a house-coat - we must remind ourselves it's darkest before the dawn. She runs back inside. 

"Makeup!" she pants. Having a half-hour, she is now, officially, running late. The tool kit comes out. Similar to a school-girl’s binder, it has a pouch for pencils, one for brushes, and two snap-in trays of varying shades of brown eye shadow. Liner. Diagonal brush. She pulls a lid to one side, ever so slowly dragging a wetted brush from corner to corner. Her eyes pop like an Egyptian queen, the image begins to take life. 

"Who is this guy again?" I’m not being sassy. 

"He's the one who's a retired lawyer from Florida, then he wrote a children's book, and is into meditation now." 

"Didn't he say he has a ten year-old daughter?" 

"I know, but we had such a great connection on the phone." Oh, say no more. When she envokes the words, “great connection,” it means they had a little spirit-sex.

She spins around triumphantly. "How do I look?" 

"That lipstick is way too dark for the eye shadow." 

“Right! See I need you to edit me!" 

I know she’d come to this conclusion without me, but tonight I’m her hype man, her manager. Online dating was still relegated to people over 40, the several times-over divorced. I hadn’t started dating yet, outside of meeting people at school or parties, so this was still, at least for me, entertainment. 

She wiggles into her bra and yanks the control-top underwear up. “It gives me a flattering shape and keeps me in line!” She pauses and smiles for her commercial. 

I remember one night the ritual felt off. The show was scheduled to air but the star did not want to go on. 

She spoke to me as she got ready. "You know I was reading this article about a woman who works at one of the premier matchmaking services in New York and she said that they spend hours with clients on personality profiles and every little detail about what the woman is seeking in a man -- right down to his socks! But it turns out, that even though women say that they want a nice guy, (someone who is well-read etc.); that they always end up going for their old type -- that went nowhere -- sending them to the agency, in the first place! Ha!" 

"No accounting for taste..." I sympathize with one of our favorite expressions. 

"Right! And it gets me thinking - what the hell do I really want!? Maybe I don't even want a boyfriend. I mean, I have my best friends, I have you, a business to run - I don't want to be someday saying ‘let's go to the movie store hon.’ Ha! Plus, what if it's late and he wants food and I'm not hungry and I don't want to make him anything... Oh, men are more trouble than they're worth aren't they?" She was being silly but I could tell she was feeling a little worn out. 

Ten years of few hits and many misses, this confession silenced us. But even though we’d done this many times before, I didn’t want her to give up. What about how she mastered healthy gourmet cooking for the cardiologist, or mastered the art of riding on the back of a harley without a padded “bitch seat.” And so on. 

Yet, I understood how it was exhausting. In the end it all comes down to inexplicable chemistry, and that was never found in abundance the way a plethora of profiles would suggest. After several attempts, it became clear that this method of meeting fed her fascination with romance, but rarely lasted long enough to fall in love with the person. (At least not through sickness and in health till death do us part.)  

It took me longer than most to try online dating. It felt nearly impossible to market myself with a small selection, from an endless trove, of random facts, and be sincere. 

“First thing people notice about me are my eyes… favorite film: “Deliverance,” favorite book: “Deliverance.”” Is anyone reading this? I really resented what I thought to be a useless charade, reducing the mysterious spark of chemistry from the cosmic to the commercial. After years of witnessing matchmaking services in-stereo, I wasn’t an expert in dating, but I was definitely missing the requisite curiosity and faith to whole-heartedly do it. 

And how are you supposed to know anything from a photo - really? There was a good year where I was smitten with a friend’s coworker, (who, sadly for me, was living with his future wife,) so all I had to live off of was our brief chance encounters and my google stalks. But not a single photo of him did him justice, or captured an ounce of his sexy, kind, funny... buoyant charm. In fact, if any of his photos were on a dating site, I would have scrolled right past him and easily have missed my soulmate.

The technology has changed, the rules of the game have changed, but there is still no accounting for taste. Or chemistry. I’m sorry to my mom, I no longer blame her for “making me hate” the theater of dating. We just got lost in the details, the rules of attraction. We didn’t know where fantasy ended and reality began, and maybe we didn’t want to.