Dating in Utah: The Wonderfully Awkward World of Online Dating

I don't know what's more pathetic, the fact that i'm writing this blog or the fact that I actually have material to write this blog with, so with that caveat being aforementioned, these are "my confessions". When I started this blog about three weeks ago I asked everyone for ideas and someone had the great idea, hey why don't you write a blog about online dating vs classic dating. To be honest, I had never really even considered the whole online dating thing before, it seemed weird to have your first real connection with a person come over the internet; it seemed insincere or at least superficial so I had always been weary. So when that same person suggested that I talk about my personal experiences I was sick to my stomach. Nevertheless, I took her advice and took the biggest leap of faith I had in a long time. So about two weeks ago I voluntarily joined the world of online dating. The fact of the matter is that the whole thing still felt superficial, I felt like the girls at the beginning of "The Social Network"(fantastic movie if you haven't seen it) who spend the night comparing their dorm mates on Hot or Not for hours, I found myself saying things like "I'd date that" or asking my eleven year old sister for her advice on who I should date. Little did I know that everyone's profile I looked at could see that I was for lack of a better term, Facebook Stalking them...   It was kinda humiliating to say the least, granted it was probably Mark Zuckerberg's fault for making Facebook stalking your crush so anonymously but needless to say I was a bit more careful about who's profile I was looking at. So my first couple of days were unfruitful, the experiment was off to a rocky start. Then I got a few flirts, I was intrigued, some of the girls were pretty cute but I didn't know how to really establish a connection with a "flirt", come to find out flirts are nothing more than the equivalent to a poke on Facebook, a farce to get attention(Sorry Destiny and Rachel, I still don't get why poke me) so I was once again frustrated with my options. In the middle of my dark confusion, I found a ray of hope a message from a girl we'll call "Ashley" mainly because it's the most common female name for girls in the their early to mid twenties. I came home on a Sunday after I had rudely been interrupted from my Sunday football nap to go to the weekly rounds in the ward. I checked my e-mail and lo and behold I had a message on my singles website, problem was I hadn't paid yet, so after a quick $15.00 investment, I read the message from "Ashley". It turned out that contrary to online stereotypes, she was completely forthcoming and outgoing, and attractive on top of it. I gave her my number and she even went out of her way to send me a text message. Maybe this online dating thing wasn't so bad, I mean I had put minimal effort but I was already having more success than I typically would pursuing people I already knew. So I focused my attention on a first date with "Ashley", which came pretty easily. She was different than most girls that I've dated in the past but in all the right ways.  The truth of the matter was that if we would have met under any different circumstances, we probably wouldn't have ever tried to date each other but because of the online setting we had a good time and there's definitely potential for at least a second date. It was completely worth my time and money to have the opportunity to meet people that I would otherwise have never had the chance to get to know. I really hope to get on a second date soon with "Ashley", she opened my horizons a lot and kind of renewed my hope in dating, which had seemed to be hopeless cause as of late. So obviously this experiment is still in the beginning phase but so far I've gotten past the awkward phase, and probably most importantly I've came to realize that there are good girls that are worth dating anywhere you look, even on online dating sites.