unhinged

it’s exhausting advertising yourself as this super cool awesome person on hinge with an excelling career and education, to come back to my apartment with an old pizza box on the bed and a pile of starry cans on my desk. i present myself as someone who’s put together, interesting on my profile.

i spoke with a guy not too long ago, a therapist (not in that way), who was extremely cute. i made him laugh according to his texts. i “clocked his tea” often simply because i knew the exact type of man i was speaking to - a chronically online tumblr boy from 2010 who listened to the neighborhood and had a million saved “justgirlythings” on their Pinterest. i can clock a gag if need be.

it was almost frustrating talking to this man. for being a therapist, he sure didn’t understand how to ask me questions about myself. granted, he didn’t even know how to text me back. i kept asking him questions about himself, like what his tumblr was like, what’s the latest trends now, what stuff is he into and all i got were basic responses and no questions for me. every once in a while he texts me something. the other day he finally texted me back saying he would be terrified if a client would find him online since we spoke about him maybe going back into his social media era (he had like 200k followers on tumblr back in the day). i told him i don’t think that’d be too bad, i follow some therapists on tiktok, even found my dermatologist there back when i was in NYC. no response back.

this cute guy texted me at 11PM and told me he thought i was cute. he was also cute and i opened the conversation by saying i tried to guess the background of one of his photos as NYC. i was wrong, made a joke about probably being bad at geoguessr, and had a very brief talk about where he was from and what he does. he’s an accountant at a FAANG company. he kept pressing for my snap, which i don’t have, and he reluctantly gave me his insta. his instagram was so polished and perfect. super aesethic. a runner. a little monster. trips to disney. nyc. sf. all the fun that i could tell he had. i told him my instagram was so bare in comparison which he thought was cool and mysterious.

he sent a selfie proving he was real. he was lying on his bed. i looked at it briefly because i forgot instagram can expire photos and he just kept asking over and over for a photo. “you don’t even have photos of yourself on here sir” he texted in a joking way. i told him i was just a shy person, but i’ll send one nonetheless. i sent a similar photo, except i was on my couch. he said “cool” and asked what i did for work. i said i do cybersecurity and i asked him what it was like being an accountant.

i didn’t get a response. i chalked it up to being late at night and i sent him a text the following morning “is it a thing in the accounting world to always hear the phrase ‘happy friday jr’?” - a small corporate joke. i waited all day for something. all i could see when opening his thread was the red glowing ring that he added a new story. he kept posting more and more, obviously active on instagram.

i went back to hinge and saw he unmatched me. i removed him from my followers and unfollowed. he still hasn’t texted back and i don’t think he ever will.

a hot doctor started texting me, he’s getting an application for residency since he’s been doing volunteer rotations in the area. super educated and he was actually interested in me. we texted back and forth for hours - turns out he loves the same banana pudding at Magnolia’s, which TIL they have in india, and he’s been to NYC. i shared some recommendations on where to go for next time and we just kept speaking. even explained HIPAA to him since that was a newer concept since that’s not a thing in india (he’s moving here, but on a visa or something). we kept talking and it was going really well and he wanted to meet up.

“so what part of [not my city] are you in?”

“[not my city]? i’m in [city]”

“oh…..i must have opened bumble when i visited my sister last weekend”

“oh”

“y’all have a nice aquarium though!”

and that was that.

i matched with a teacher on hinge, someone i’ve talked with previously and unmatched on bumble when the convo fizzled out. we spoke for a bit, until he kept pressing why i don’t wanna have kids. i said i don’t want the responsibility. he said LMAO. and that was that.

i spoke with a SWE who wanted me to sit on his face while i teach him how to use applescript - apparently according to y’all i was dumb not to take him up on that offer. (i’m not going to a guy’s house who can’t tell the difference between bumble and grindr jfc)

i spoke at length for months with another guy - a network engineer about an hour away from me (thanks bumble) and that fizzled out as well. he drinks too much and apparently makes plans he doesn’t keep, like being surprised when i asked him if he’s still down for pad thai and making fun of the autonomous robots that deliver it.

“…we’re going out this weekend?

oh my god, i’m so sorry i was drunk i didn’t remember this. but that’s ok! i’m excited anyways and got nothing to do - let’s hang out!”

and then 1AM that morning

“hey man, sorry to call it off, but i won’t make it”

i’ve sent him a few memes here and there, but not much after that.

i spoke with a guy, rather i sent messages to a brick wall who eventually would answer a day later - he was this CPS guy who took care of kids during the day and studied the ecological state of the world afterwards. he would drink matcha and have a tote bag - if you need a visual.

i called it off after he stopped texting by saying “hey man, you know if you ever need someone to hike with, just let me know!” and that was that. he asked if we could go the next day and he’d be excited to hang out.

as i pulled up to the park, it started to rain and i asked if we could grab food nearby instead. turns out he never actually had plans to go and he stood me up, in the rain, in a park 30 minutes away from my place. i awkwardly cried in the UberX Share.

it’s been exhausting trying to date and i’m just trying to wrap my head around all of this. i’ve never done this. this isn’t grindr where you’re very forward in what you want, it’s strategic. it’s planning and it’s just a lot of frustration. and it’s hard trying to be frustrated with it when people tell me it’s “great that you’re getting matches - you don’t know how bad straight people have it”.

i speak to my roommate about it, he’s “drowning in pussy” as he states with his bumble showing 99+ likes from women, but he, for the life of him, can’t talk to a woman. he thinks i can’t either, and maybe, but at least i know not to threaten to show up at a situationship’s house demanding an answer, calling them over and over, and punching the wall repeatedly. maybe i’m decent at one thing when it comes to dating, i guess.