The “Sexter Man”
The art of seduction is now through sextual word-smithery. I don’t care much for it! — The Elusive Optimist
Case File 2
Do you remember what it was like — to catch a look across the room, sit just at the right angle so that you can see the person from the corner of your eye but at the same time pretend that you haven’t noticed them. When you talk merrily away on a topic with your poor unsuspecting friend, who doesn’t realize that every morsel of your attention at that point is on that person you are pretending not to notice. Knowing that at any given minute they will come to you and say hi and offer to buy you a coffee or a drink and ask for your number. The thrill of that moment!
Now, fast forward to the app-age, where a person sitting right next to you in the bar would rather swipe your picture on Tinder but would balk at the idea of approaching you in person. Someone who’d rather have verbal diarrhea with your digital avatar but be unsure of saying hi to you in person. Not because they don’t want to, but because how outdated and stalker-ish it is to approach someone in person (yes, another topic added to our list of posts)! I believe this swipe culture, has also made it so much easier to have conversations without any inhibitions on text, why shouldn’t it be? After all they are talking to the picture on their phone and not you. Things that would come up way later as a discussion or is a real experience instead (how alien!), now is a part of the ‘sextual’ questionnaire.
The most common question I have been asked (at times this is literally the fifth text) — “are you a good kisser?” My response has been various combinations of this — “Absolutely not, I am horrible at kissing, I slobber all over, have chronic halitosis and really think kissing is overrated and disgusting! Ewwwwww!”. In the silence that follows this response, I send the emoji that rolls its eyes. I would just about give anything to see the person’s face when they read what I’ve sent. Sigh, people don’t have a sense of humor these days? What do they expect as a reply when they ask this question? Really!
There was this one guy who wanted to play 21 questions on text. My initial reaction was to say I suddenly feel I’ve regressed to being 20 years old, but I was curious to see where this goes. This guy has already told me he is looking for something very casual, doesn’t need to know life stories or pretend to want to know how my day was! He just wanted to ‘hook-up’, but was too polite to say it outright. I knew this was not going to end well, but I really wanted to know how deep this rabbit hole is and if I would find this attractive. Let me tell you I think we reached Siberia, from the other end of the world! He probably asked me questions about every possible sexual topic, every question you can think of, and finally said he wanted to see my ‘picture’. So, I sent him one with me completely covered head-to-toe (really, you did not expect this?). I’m presuming he did not know what to do with that, so then he asked me if could send one of his, a ‘subtle’ one. I was half inclined to say no, but since this went so far, I said ok. He sent me one in sweatpants, and all I could see, other than for that brief second that he had good abs, was that his bathroom mirror and sink were really dirty, the mirror had what looked like toothpaste spatter on it, shudder! I really wanted to go nuclear mom on him and tell him he should clean up or at least crop the picture before sending it out! I could visualize me going to his place in a hazmat suit to clean his bathroom, not for him but for me (in case in some parallel universe we acted on the 21 answers) and maybe even spray him down for a good measure. Long story short, I told him I did not see anything happening between us and he should continue his merry conversation elsewhere. He was quite nice about it and actually went on to tell me that he had a ‘booty call’ a few days ago. Sigh, I had to sit on my hands not to type something tongue-in-cheek back at him. I wish him well!
I’ve had a few more people I matched with, whose profiles I found interesting. When they started asking me questions within two days on how I “like’ things and if I am ‘vanilla’ or the multitude other questions in this space, I just switch off. I’m all for sexting, having fun and really enjoying the space people create together as a part of dating. This weird act of pseudo- courtship, where the person could actually be watching some inane program on Netflix and on the side asking a list of people their ‘preferences’ doesn’t cut it for me. Shouldn’t this be a part of an experience instead of a questionnaire? I understand that Covid-19 has made dating impossible, but I still find it odd that people want to know your sexual preferences before they get to know you as a person. I wonder if I am outdated, but I still prefer anticipation of meeting someone in person and seeing if there is chemistry, over this crazy, vacuous and honestly lazy sexting biographies.
I am not judging people and their preferences, each to their own, whatever rocks your boat! This is about what rocks ‘my boat’, give me the guy in the coffee shop any day!
While you ponder on what I wrote, the next post is on the “Phantom Man”. We have them at three levels of ghosting, tune in to know more.
Till then, have a lovely day!
The Elusive Optimist
