Match Death Dot Com

Every time I have a moment of clarity—which, thank God, is not very often—I’m assailed by three miserable, soul-scorching facts: (2) I’m not Stacy London; (2) I’m me and I’m old; (3) I’ll never have a future with Mack.

The last time I had this clear moment was about six months ago and it made me do something murky indeed. Thinking I wanted a future with someone, even if that someone couldn’t be Mack, I made myself sign up with Match Death Dot Com. And although I realize there’s nothing new to be said about online dating, let me just say something anyway: 

Plucking the right mate out of the ether is like plucking the right dress off of the clothes rack—the best results will come to the normal. Clinton and the fabulous Stacy, who both have bodies of normal proportions, freely admit this on What Not to Wear. It’s the marginal, weird, and unusually shaped who have to try on five thousand skirts and then take that five thousandth skirt to a tailor. The odder you are, the more faith you need to keep on believing you’ll find your match. You’ll also need a few extra decades, by which time you will find your date, and he will be the grinning grim reaper. 

The thing about Match Death Dot Com is that most of the men who use it are normal, or just pretending to be because they want to meet normal women. By normal I guess I mean the majority, and the majority of my peer group today is evidently quite fond of the kayak. I suppose I could cram myself into a kayak, but the tumor that ate up half my brain’s balance might balk at being at sea and make me throw up all over my date. Can one really expect that a man who won’t tolerate baggage or drama (their profiles say this, I kid you not!) will want to put up with the bathos of barf? Personally, I think one cannot. 

As the weeks wore on, I gave up on finding a match with whom I might share even one interest, and focused on those who, not being picky, might offer, at least, the comfort of context. Imagine my joy when I found him on line, the west coast version of Tony Soprano, living only twelve miles away. Honestly, he had just retired from a successful career in waste management, and still went, along with the rest of his large Catholic family, to Mom’s house for dinner on Sundays. 

He spelled my name G-e-n-e, but so what? To have a place to go once a week, to eat home-made gnocchi with pederast priests, to belong to any living family at all, would more than make up for such a small lapse. That, and his being connected with so many hit men. After all, I was doing all this just to get over Mack, but what if I couldn’t get over Mack? Worse, what if I found out Mack couldn’t love me because he was loving somebody else? I’d have no choice but to get my new boyfriend to break both his legs. His girlfriend, though, would be drowned in a kayak. The judicious Miss London, I’m sure, would approve.