Into The (J)Dating Pool

Summer always holds the promise of new adventures. I'm not sure why that is. I associate winter with quiet walks through thick, slow-falling snowflakes, hot cocoa, and quiet Cara time. Summer, on the other hand, is for Cub games, summer sports, cute shoes, wild n'crazy Saturday nights, and general tomfoolery. When I got back from Israel last summer, I was really looking forward to those adventures, and making all sorts of new friends with whom to engage in said tomfoolery. It didn't quite happen the way I'd planned. Yet here I am, a whole year later, expecting this summer to be what last year wasn't.

So, in typical Cara-fashion, I decided to do something differently, following the age-old logic that you can't do the same thing over and over again and expect to get different results. (Sidebar: this piece of wisdom has been attributed to Mark Twain, Ben Franklin, and Albert Einstein. There's no proof that any of them ever said it, in any form.) What is this radical new change, you ask? Brace yourself...I joined JDate.

If that sound I just heard was you falling off your chair laughing, I can't be surprised. I've held out for years, adamantly refusing to join the ranks of the JDaters. I caved. Sort of- I'm not expecting to find true love over the internet. I'm really just hoping to meet people that I wouldn't have otherwise met. Maybe a few of them will turn out to be cool people. If not, bad dates make great stories, and my married/committed friends do look to me to provide them with entertaining stories of Singledom. Besides, if nothing pans out with any of the other JDaters, I at least know that I tried something new, and didn't sit at home twiddling my thumbs (or, more likely, wielding an embroidery needle, reading a book, or watching a movie. Or 2 out of 3 simultaneously) waiting for that one nice Jewish boy to realize how fabulous I am and sweep me off my feet.

I don't know if this signals the start of a cynical phase, a realistic phase, or a "I save my romanticism for special occassions" phase. Regardless, the water wings have come off, and I've dived into the pool. Good thing I know how to dog paddle.