Dating Singles Over 50

So, I’ve been receiving emails lately with the nefarious subject line of “Dating Singles Over 50” in its content.

I am always curious and somewhat paranoid about Internet cookies and tracking and such, and often wonder how exactly someone has targeted me as a specific audience for a particular product, site, contest, etc.

I do understand that my email address is likely on some Master List somewhere, and all the hounds of the universe have access to it.  Thus, I am chosen by Makin$fromHomeGuy52392 as the perfect recipient for instructions on how to eNlarG my pENiIs… however, some of these emails just go too far.

This ‘Singles Over 50’ thing really sticks in my craw (there‘s a modern and young person thing to say, Catherine).  Ditto that for emails about AARP.  Sure, I may be single, but I am not 50, nor am I interested in someone over the age of 50, and, if I were over 50, I certainly wouldn‘t be admitting to it and clicking the email.  Not for a very, very, very long time, at least.  I’m barely able to admit to being over 40.

I once tried a famous on-line ‘relationship’ site (not really a dating site, I guess?),  and among my first set of “here’s what we found for you based on 1377 points of matching criteria!” matches was a man who was somewhere well over 50, looked like a Grandpa, and had a cane.  I remember scanning the profile photo and talking to myself, because the photo was one taken at a wedding;  it included a bride, a groom, and the cane man.

“Well, it can’t be a profile for the groom-- who the hell would post his wedding picture on a dating site?  Can it be the grandpa guy?  Tell me it’s not the grandpa guy!  Oh my god, my perfect match is a grandpa!  I’m so old!!!”



Now, I’m going to go into a short aside regarding canes.  There are, I’m sure, plenty of men who need the assistance of a cane due to injuries, health difficulties, the need for a fashion accessory, whatever.  I am not averse to cane users, I do not abhor the idea of them, or anything like that.
There is a difference, however, between a cane-wielding 30-something guy with a bad knee due to a motorcycle accident, and Grandpa with his double hip replacement.

After the shock of my Grandpa match, I started clicking through some of my other ‘perfect’ matches.  There were other senior citizen-type characters in there as well; missing teeth, teen aged grandchildren, balding.  Not bald in the cool and sexy way, like, on purpose; but bald in the icky way, like, with tufts of hair on the sides and/or comb overs.  I almost started crying.

Eventually I discovered that the automatic age criteria for my matches was set at something like ‘ages 40-55’, which I immediately changed to ‘ages 18-23.’
I’m joking.  But I did lower the numbers by quite a bit.  It did not include the allowance for any ‘dating singles over 50.’

In the end, I know for a fact that I will not be dating anyone over the age of 50 until I am at least 50, myself.  Even then, it might be a stretch.  It frightens me to think that I may still be ‘dating’ at the age of 50, but I am choosing to put that thought on the back burner.  Dating in your 40’s is not exactly the happiest thought, but I have become accustomed to the idea, regardless of my feelings towards that odious benchmark, and others to come.

I don’t care if 40 is the new 20 or if 50 is the new 30.  That’s for the people who are settled in their lives and have found great peace and joy in their accomplishments.  And the people who have a lot of money to have surgical feats performed on their bodies. And the people who are in their 30’s and sadly attempting to make themselves/their over 40 friends feel better.

It generally doesn’t work for a person who, at this moment, looks like Medusa on crack, is wearing Scottie Dog pajamas, and sporting an age-defying olive and mud mask on her face whilst drinking coffee.

Overall, though, I clean up pretty nicely, and am happy with my current looks, sans Medusa hair and mud mask, of course.  And, while I am none too pleased with admitting to being over 40, and soon will be one year closer to that other number, there is no way in Hell I will be dating a guy who looks like a Grandpa.

Check back with me in twenty years.  Until then, I’M DELETING YOUR EMAILS.

p.s.    http://signifyingno-thing.blogspot.com/2009/08/sticks-in-my-craw.html   Funny.