Unicorns Do Exist

I was just now reading The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, by Mark Manson, and was taken by a passage in which he says that the path to success in dating is full of shit heaps and shame.  He means that you don’t win if you don’t play, and many shots on goal are necessary.  It really struck a chord for me, and brought back the many enjoyable and educational experiences I have had through ‘gray area’ dating sites, as well as the many less enjoyable but still educational experiences.  The following story has a point: that unicorns do exist.  The odds are long, but not zero.  I can attest to it.  If you see the notation “please provide new number” in a profile, sometimes, just sometimes, there’s a story behind it with a very happy ending.

Divorced in my mid-40s, and having turned up nothing desirable in my circle that was not already taken with a long waiting list on which my name did not appear, I turned to Match.com and its ilk.  After a few years of increasingly disappointing results, and the stunning realization that both I and my ex had been growing older and developing wrinkles all that time, I had pretty much given up hope for a long term loving relationship and had decided to settle for the health benefits of occasional sex and companionship with younger women.   I found that Sugar Daddy sites were full of scams that were sufficiently disguised and exhausting as to almost completely negate the possibility of landing a real one; after all, entering those sites is like painting ‘cheat me’ on your back.  This was very disappointing because that kind of arrangement sounded plausible and desirable to me.  I eventually concluded that TER was the best single resource, at least unless you are privy to some network within the ‘upper 0.001%’ demographic like hedge fund managers, and that after one learns to read between the lines, the number of positive experiences greatly exceeds the number of disappointing ones. But all were educational.   Although my expectations were realistic, I always in the back of my mind held irrational hope that just maybe I’d cross paths with a woman whose heart was still open, was cultured and brilliant, had a great sense of humor, had her head on straight, didn’t want kids, and liked older men.  In the hobbyist terminology, this was my unicorn.

She showed up at my doorstep five years ago (several years after I started using escorts).  She was from eastern Europe, but fully fluent and colloquial in English.  She gently and with economy of words logically demolished my arguments about various topics, responded to my rural environs with enthusiasm because they reminded her of her childhood home at the edge of a forest, left the guest room spotless and generally a trail of effortless order in her wake.  Because of how we started, it took us a long time to trust each other completely.  But we kept finding more and more commonality in our sensibilities and interests, sometimes to an eerie degree (it turns out our grandparents might have come from the same village in what is now Ukraine), and eventually settled into an exclusive arrangement/relationship which has grown into something really great for both of us.  It looks and feels like love, and we have recently begun using the L-word.  She is able to pursue her advanced degree and is blossoming into a confident happy woman.  I am, with her help, getting my emotional shit together finally at age 60 and get to go through the day with that internal hum of thoughts and desire for someone young and beautiful.  We have never had a fight.  Seriously, not one.  She is on good terms with my sons.  She means what she says and always does what she says she’s going to do.  She does not want to have children of her own, and temperamentally isn’t attracted to the idea of marriage.  She has zero tolerance for drama.  I know, she sounds like a man you’d like to know.  I think we are going to last.

So how did this impossible event happen?  If I had approached her in a public venue or party she would not have given me a chance.  I’m fit and accomplished, but let’s face it, I’m twice her age and not the life of the party.  She is startlingly good looking, brilliant, and hot, and 30 years younger.  Well, a lot of things lined up.  She escorted for a year because the US healthcare system had mugged her and bankrupted her, despite her working steadily as a restaurant manager.  She answered an ad for modeling work, thinking it might dig her out of debt, and – surprise – the work description was somewhat different.  She said oh WTF and I was her second date.  So we had scripted time in which she found some depth in me and common interests.  On my part, when I realized how great she was, I decided to commit in a way that I never really had before in my life – letting the other person know that they were absolutely #1 in my life, and that I was willing to behave that way in the foreseeable future unilaterally, without an equal commitment from them.  This often works, in case you haven’t heard.  I also provided the kind of career support and encouragement that her parents would have provided if they had been paying attention to how exceptional she was.  Instead, she had packed her bags in disgust and left for the US.  The age difference is not quite so extreme when you factor in that eastern European women are more mature for their years than American women – yes, those lyrics do come to mind, guys.  Also, we’re both kind of solitary and dominant personalities so we don’t live together and I don’t put too many demands on her time, beyond what she would choose anyway in the form of desired breaks from school and from the city.  The arrangement then worked for long enough that love, as opposed to infatuation, had a chance to grow.

The public service aspect of this post is to provide yet one more anecdote pointing out the benefits of tolerating this gray area of dating.  I know I’m preaching to the choir, but….our society would be healthier if we fully accepted the flexibility of human relations.  My lady first came to my attention on a site which focused on one metropolitan area, was of a type intermediate between TER and Craig’s List, and which has since been shut down.  I don’t expect the forces of prudishness and self-righteousness in this country to weaken during the next four years.  Has she been victimized in some way?  By the former US healthcare system, yes.  By gray area dating? – she would say absolutely not.

The moral of the story for you hobbyists, newbies or old hands, is to carry realistic expectations, but also some hope, and if you encounter someone who seems too good to be true, give her a chance – it might just be your unicorn.  Here’s a crucial free tip:  If a number you call reaches someone halfway articulate who is serving as screener and scheduler, and they ask you some probing questions, this is a very good sign -- think about it from the other side.

Peace, and good luck