I recently moved to Charlotte, North Carolina for a new job. I don’t know anyone, so I decided to join Tinder to meet new people who could help me get acclimated to the city. Tinder is known for being a hookup app, so I definitely wasn’t expecting to fall in love.
If you’re not familiar with Tinder, it’s a dating app mostly used by young professionals in their 20s and 30s. To use the app, you set up a profile then you select your preferred age range and location for dates. After your preferences are set, you will start seeing dating profiles of people who match your criteria. To show interest in a person, you have to swipe right. If you’re not interested, you swipe left. When you match with someone, you can start messaging them through the app.
I noticed that guys who had a profile bio were more sincere about wanting a relationship. I avoided men who complained about being a good guy that women overlooked. That was an indicator that the issue was most likely them! Within the first week, I matched with 14 guys. Out of that group, I chose two guys to go on a date with.
To keep the men anonymous, I’m going to give them nicknames. My first date was with “Military Man”. I’m naming him this because he is in the military. Before going on our date, we didn’t talk on the phone, we only communicated through Tinder. The night of the date, he offered to pick me up from my apartment. I was skeptical because I didn’t know him, but since I was new to the city, we both felt that it would be more convenient if we rode together. I made sure to send my friends and siblings screenshots of him in case I came up missing LOL. When I saw him in person, he wasn’t unattractive, but he looked better in his profile pictures. Early on, I noticed that he was very cocky and arrogant, which is a huge turn off for me. As soon as I sat inside the car, he turned on the light and looked me up and down. He said he needed to make sure that I looked like my profile picture. I was offended, but I brushed off my agitation.
Since this was our first date, we wanted a more casual vibe, so we decided to go to a pool hall. After getting settled, we started talking and getting to know each other better. The conversation initially felt more like an interview because he rambled on and on about all the requirements that he expected in a partner. He made sure to let me know that I met “most” of those requirements. He also told me that he was still single because he was very picky. (Ummm No shit!) I just sipped my drink and quietly listened. By this point, I knew that I would not be going on a second date with him.
After I had a couple of drinks, the date started to get better. He actually turned out to be a decent guy. I learned that he was very active in the community and that he did a lot of volunteer work with youth. Overall the date was cool, but I didn’t feel like we were that compatible.
My second date was with “The Tattooed Musician.” I’m naming him this because he is a tattoo artist and a musician. I talked to him on the phone a few times before we went out, so I had a feel of his personality. On the night of our date, we met up in NODA, which is a popular art district in downtown Charlotte. Earlier that day, he told me that I should dress up for the date because we were going somewhere nice. Excited, I wore a cute mini dress. When I arrived for the date he was dressed as if he had just left the gym. Needless to say, I was annoyed. He also looked very different in person, which wasn’t a good thing. The date was very casual, but it was nice. We walked around downtown then we stopped at a bar to eat dinner. After we finished eating, he bought a bottle of Moscato, and we went back to his place to watch tv.
I thought we would have watched a movie, but instead, we watched several episodes of Family Guy(I will leave it at that.) I heard a lot of moving around upstairs, so I asked him if he had a roommate. He nonchalantly said that he was living with his mom temporarily to save money to buy a tattoo studio. He explained that he and his mom had an agreement that she would stay upstairs when he had guests over. That didn’t really help his case.
Overall, my experience with Tinder was okay, but I realize that online dating just isn’t for me.
