Cindy Brady

Another day, another hellish Match.com dream date.

Let's start with last night's date, whom I shall call "Cindy." Cindy, as you might expect, is a few years younger than I. Neither he nor I was sure whether we had a lot in common, but anyone with a nice profile pic who knows all the words to Rapper's Delight (and sings them in the shower) can't be all bad, right? We had a long chat on Monday night and agreed to meet up last night at Citrus Club. I have swim practice on Wednesdays, so we agreed to meet up afterwards, around 8:15 p.m.

Everything seemed fine until we met. I called him after I got out of the pool, and he seemed to be in a relaxed mood. The instant we met, the tone changed. He became withdrawn, distracted and argumentative. Citrus Club was too crowded, so we went across the street to a Lebanese place. The maitre d' sat us in a high-traffic area. He complained throughout the meal of being buffeted by people walking by, yet did nothing to solve the problem. He poured too much hot sauce on his couscous, and complained about that as well. He stared intently at the map behind me.

Then he proceeded to attack me. "You say on your profile that you have never been in a committed relationship," he said. "How can you be 36 years old and have never been in a committed relationship?"

The date was a bust before this and was only going downhill. I doubt that he would have accepted any response that I gave, but at least I should have answered the question on my own terms. Instead, I decided to answer the question on his.

"Quite frankly, I've never met the right guy. For me, relationships are not a goal in themselves, but instead are a consequence of meeting the right guy. It's rare that I meet someone who really sparks my interest, and for a vareity of reasons nothing has ever panned out with those guys."

"I suppose part of the reason why I don't meet a lot of guys I connect with is that, for as large a city as San Francisco is, I'm rarely in a position to meet guys. All of my co-workers are straight; all of my triathlon buddies are straight. I've got a good group of gay friends, but I've tapped out all of their connections."

"Part of it too, I think, has to do with the fact that I hate the process of dating. Dating is often so reductivist, like we're recruiters sizing up a candidate. I'd like to think that dating is more of an opportunity to meet a lot of really interesting people and seeing where it leads."

We argued for a few minutes about whether I was entitled to dislike dating. "How can you say you dislike dating when you've never experienced what it's like on the other side," he said.

The argument was quickly growing absurd. I don't care whether anybody has been in a relationship. Just because you've been in a relationship doesn't mean that you have the emotional toolkit to be in a successful relationship. Plenty of people go from failed relationship to failed relationship, but plenty of other people have made their first relationship work.

After a few more pointed comments about how slowly I was eating, we paid up and said our goodbyes.

Next time I'll write about my date with "Marcia."