The Argument for Postmodern Matchmaking : Part 2

Secrets of a Fix-up Fanatic: How to Meet & Marry Your Match
By Susan Shapiro

(Page 2 of 2)

"How do you know it was the husband's fault?" Aaron wanted to know. "What if it was the wife who screwed up the marriage?"

"A guy who has just been dumped would not be feeling confident enough to make a play for a beautiful, famous woman," I told him. "Plus, people who've been screwed over usually play the sympathy card by saying, 'My wife just left me.'"

"What if it was a mutual decision to break up?" Aaron continued to defend all of mankind.

I considered Aaron's defense of this male he had never even met and conceded it was possible. But even if the demise of George's domestic scenario wasn't at all his fault, he had legal entanglements to take care of before he was ready for the kind of full-speed-ahead fix-up Julie said she wanted. Since she was thirty-seven and had never been married, she was focused on finding a mate and having a baby right away. Thus I didn't want Julie to waste time, money, or energy on someone not as ready or as forthright as she was, not to mention that he was still literally wed to somebody else he owned a home with.

Sorry if I sound prudish, but I figured from experience that if George couldn't be totally straight with me-a potentially ideal love connector-he could lie or withhold important information from his dates too, perhaps until after they were postcoital. As a married woman who'd been around the block with bad boyfriends, and had learned how to weed through a lot of weasels to find my own rare and honorable hero, I wasn't playing games here. I was more like the referee calling out-of-bounds.

Still, I wasn't sending George to the penalty box to punish him for real or imagined transgressions. I was basically just implying, "Come back when you are officially available," and filed his request in the back of my mind to revisit at a later date, after his divorce papers were filed. I knew somebody who knew George's soon-to-be-ex-wife, and made a mental note to see if I could get her side of the story. Amazing what a matchmaker's fact-finding mission sometimes revealed.

So what if George wound up frustrated or annoyed? I didn't want to court any headaches, and was only in the market for real husband material for my clients. It didn't matter to me if I won or lost a popularity contest among cads not up to the high standards of my romantic roster. If he turned out to be a decent fellow as a divorcé, I could always call him back to invite him to a singles soiree. If he didn't come, who cared? How refreshing not to give a damn if he didn't like me.

The point is that these kind of in-depth, behind-the-scenes interactions are another huge perk of having someone you know matchmaking for you. Since we know who we are setting up personally, we take everything very personal. We have a shared goal, and our reputation as a perceptive, smart, and serious fixer-upper is at stake. One misstep could hurt someone we care about, along with our future prospects. So we apply protective filters and shields, assessing each member of the potential gene pool so you don't have to second-guess who is not earnest, for real, worthy, or good enough for you. We offer you a divine yin-yang balance to unburden you and keep you sane and serene. We can be a pest, or a pain, or a flaming bitch so you don't have to be. You can remain shy, retiring, passive, forgiving, and/or flirtatious while we do the sorting, heavy lifting, research, dirty work, and rejecting.

Yes, there are cynics out there who think a fixer-upper procures partners like a pimp. In actuality, a good matchmaker is part older sibling, part private detective, part shrink, part bully, and part volunteer bodyguard out there to protect you.

If you're the least bit nervous about trying the matchmaker method, ask yourself one question. Who do you trust more-your sister, boss, and best friend? Or out-of-town companies wanting to make big bucks on your loneliness by linking you to their cyberclients around the country, with no legal motive or ability to check any facts or verify anybody's posted vital statistics?

Indeed, when The New York Times "Modern Love" column editor Daniel Jones was asked to share his observations about trends in twenty-first-century dating, he deduced that, "In pursuing love, electronic communication allows us to be more reckless, fake, distracted and isolated than ever before." Jones, the editor of the popular male essay anthology The Bastard on the Couch, opined that "men and women today are apt to plunge into love affairs via text message, cut them off by PowerPoint, lie about who they are and what they want in forums and blogs and online dating sites, pretend they're young when they're old and old when they're young, ignore the people they're physically with for those who are a keystroke away, shoo their children off their laps to caress their BlackBerrys, and spend untold hours staring at pixilated porn stars."

So when you're finished playing with cyberfire, failing, and paying for services that often disappoint you, then come back down to earth, where your fellow earthlings can lead you to lasting love cost-free. If you're still skeptical, examine the motives of people you know to set you up. Members of your family want you to go forth and multiply your tribe, which is their tribe. Most friends and colleagues who are amateur setter-uppers want to help you out of the goodness of their heart, a much sweeter motive than profit. Those who are married hope you join their ranks of those bound in holy matrimony, which reinforces their own choices. Single fix-up fanatics, like Alicia Silverstone's character on the recent TV series Miss Match, often unconsciously feel that by giving you love they will find love themselves. What's not to love about that?

Plus, all matchmakers relish sharing their own romantic lessons and following up on their pet projects. You know who they are, where they are coming from, and you can hear examples and swap stories often, over the phone and in the flesh. So you will be able to endlessly discuss and dissect the interesting two-hour date you just went on, with the one person on the planet who is almost as emotionally invested in the final outcome as you are.

Furthermore, cultivating a few matchmakers from your inner circle will force you to get out of your house, your head, and your cybersystem. You will have to get over your shyness, timidity, doubts, hesitations, fears, insecurities, shame, and seclusion. You'll need to take some chances, make decisions, and ask someone you know for exactly what you need-face-to-face, using direct eye contact, putting yourself on the line, and feeling very open and vulnerable. You will need to ask questions, answer them, argue, risk rejection, and otherwise intimately relate to a living, breathing being who cares about you. This important exercise in continual complex social interaction will provide excellent practice for dealing with the living, breathing mate with whom you will soon be spending your future.

Copyright © 2006 by Susan Shapiro.

About the Author

Susan Shapiro has written for The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, The Village Voice, Salon.com, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, and Jane.