Matt's Whacked View of What a Modern, Smart, Geeky Woman Wants
I want to tell you about one of the awful, horrible dates I went on at the beginning of my online dating experience. You won’t read about this particular date in the book...but it does highlight how disconnected lots of men are from our current realities.
Early on, Match.com emailed me round after round of potential dates. One of the profiles was Matt, a college football player-turned-MBA. His profile seemed interesting, so I clicked through. At that moment, he happened to be online, so we started chatting. I learned that he spoke a little Japanese and wanted to spend time living overseas. He even told me his full name, so as we messaged back and forth, I did a quick background check on him. He had, in fact, played football. He did hold an MBA. His story was accurate, as far as I could tell.
And he was very, very good looking.
In a way, Matt represented the iconic all-American boyfriend dream. He was six feet tall, had brown hair and blue eyes and was gainfully employed. Chatting over IM, he seemed to hold a good conversation -- if digital -- talking about music he liked and the past few movies he’d seen. We didn’t seem to share much in common beyond an interest in Japan, but I was told to “date everyone.” So when he abruptly asked me out for drinks the next evening, I said yes.
Matt was nice and asked a lot of questions. Did I like Dave Matthews? (Meh.) Did I drink Sam Adams? (Not really.) Did I follow the Bears, since I was from Chicago? (Ugh, football?) And then eventually, did I want to come back to his apartment? (What the hell, why not?) He invited me up, and inside it was also...nice. (Open Pottery Barn catalogue, flip to “Living Room #2.)
He sat down next to me on the couch and draped his arm across the top, stopping to brush some of the curls off of my forehead. “Tell me about the craziest experience you’ve had,” Matt asked, smiling at me.
So I told him the story of how once, while driving the North/ South Korea border on a reporting assignment, I made a wrong turn. My road map was in Chinese, and while I was able to read the characters, I couldn’t even navigate a map in English. Distracted and lost, I accidentally followed a convoy into the demilitarized zone. I was driving straight towards a military checkpoint, when a swarm of soldiers jumped out into the street waving machine guns at my car. I was offered a military escort back through the gate and just barely escaped an international inquiry. That, I told him, was pretty crazy.
“Yeah,” Matt said. “I’m surprised they let a lady go out alone like that, driving in a foreign country. That is crazy.”
Wait... Did you just say what I think you said?!
“Well this one time, I was in a bar with some of my buddies,” he began. “This Asian chick was like... ‘You know what? You should go get your cock pierced!’ Except she said it with a funny accent. ‘Coku pear-sed!’ And I was like... yeah! There’s a tattoo place next door. So we walked over there with two shots of Jägermeister and I just went for it.”
“Went for it?” I repeated, dumbfounded.
“Yeah. I got my ‘coku pear-sed’. Everyone tells me that the warm metal ball feels really good on the tongue, like it’s fun to play with.” Matt said, moving his hand up my thigh.
You can see my dilemma. For one thing, I believe strongly that women should be allowed to drive. Even in Korea. Match.com couldn’t have done a worse job at matching us. But more importantly, how could Matt have gotten this far in life to think that “ladies” like myself shouldn’t be allowed to operate vehicles in other countries? Or that I’d be allured by the promise of some sad, alcohol-fueled penis piercing?
Matt was one of many, many terrible dates. He, like many of the brogrammers you’re probably seeing on OKCupid or former jocks on Match.com, have a whacked view of what a modern, smart, geeky woman wants.
In the next few months leading up to the official launch of my book, I’m assembling a group of women who are interested in correcting Matt’s worldview. Our group is called Team Data, and members will receive one or two fun activities a month along with a digest of helpful info. (Advice for men looking to land someone like you? Strong women you admire, and who Matt’s of the world should know more about? DIY charts and graphs to rate your dates, just like I did...) Much of the action will take place on Tumblr and Facebook. But we’ll make sure our voices are heard everywhere.
If you want to join Team Data, get in on the action here. We’re sending out our first assignment next week! The first 100 members to join get one of these snazzy T-shirts, which also help support cancer awareness during October.
