Tinder Moments

I recently went out of town with a good friend of mine, and upon becoming bored with our own company, we decided to seek out friendship an instantaneous way. Where does one go when in search of an immediate friendship? Why online of course!  Another friend of mine had been playing around with, and trying to get me to download this phone app where you can meet guys--I know there are a lot of them out there, and quite honestly, I've avoided such endeavors and applications because I just think it's weird and uncertain. Also, it should be no surprise to anyone that I'm not really looking for a serious relationship right now. Sure, maybe I should be now that I've hit the big 3-0, but oddly enough, the older I get, the more comfortable and satisfied I become with my spontaneous freedom.

So, because of this self-entitled freedom, we both decided to download an app called "Tinder." I'm probably like the old grandma right now whose mind has been blown by seemingly self-discovering this new world of technological interaction, and it need not be a surprise to anyone that this application is bluntly superficial and perpetuates egotistical ideals of self.

Nevertheless, this app became somewhat of an obsessive game for us both as we sat side by side in a dimly lit bar, speeding through hundreds of men--swiping left for no and right for yes. When a successful right swipe had taken place by both parties, an image would pop up proclaiming "it's a match!" The excitement surrounding the successes--possibly fueled by our beer intake--caused us to look up from our phones and socially interact with one another in astonishment of the process. Before we knew it we had stacked up a nice little list of potential male suitors--suitors that might I add, we never met.

Upon returning to Charleston the fun continued and during times of boredom my friend and I would open Tinder and continue the swipe game. It wasn't long before we had a long list of Charleston suitors--more suitors we didn't intend to meet. After several days of this, my friend finally proclaimed that she had made it to the end of her tinder men matches, and upon looking at the app I realized I had too. Of course with all these people on here, and both of us having gone through the entire lineup of eligible bachelors in the Charleston area, we were sure to have some of the same matches.

I wanted to do some social research--pure, raw, social research. Driving home from my night class, I called up my friend and invited her over to my apartment for wine and cheese and a little game. I rushed home, uncorked my biggest and finest selection of Trader Joe's Cabernet Sauvignon and plugged in my iPhone--it was going to need to be at full power for the evening's events.

Around 8 that evening, my friend showed up and we immediately started partaking in the wine and talking about life, work, money--all boring stuff--but then the topic turned to relationship issues. Ok, this is where I wanted to go. I went in my bedroom and unplugged my phone, which fortunately was showing a 90% battery life, and opened my Tinder app.

"You know Iz, I have to wonder--we've both been playing on this app for over a week now, and I'm sure we have to have some similar matches. I think we should play a little Go Tinder Fish."

With both apps open, and the red wine flowing, I started to go through the list of men that I had messaged.

 "Do you have any Brads? No? No, Brads? mmmmmk. Do you have any Johns? Yes! a match!"

The rules and interactions of the game had quickly changed, and Iz and I were now making matches of our matches. In a world where we are all so busy, yet so unbusy, our social interactions have quickly turned technological, and I was curious to know if these interactions had erased personability and if desires to know and understand others was based on mutual interest, or pure, raw, and shallow image alone. We started going through the messages.

"OMG--John matched you too? Have you messaged him? What did he say?"

Iz--"He wanted to meet me tonight at Red Drum!"

"No! Shut the front door. He asked me that too! Wait, don't you have a picture on your Tinder with both of us in it? "

It's certainly not surprising that someone was talking to the same person at once, or even that the individual didn't recognize that the two people he was talking to were friends. Vintage dating protocol would have been void of any type of social media, and would have occurred purely through chance occurrences and spontaneous phone interactions. With our ever increasing technological capabilities we now have the ability to essentially meet anyone at anytime regardless of whether or not we would ever come across them in our daily interactions. With facebook and twitter we know who they are talking to, where they hang out, and even what they are thinking without ever having to talk to them. And with Tinder, we can even tell how many fish someone has on their line at the pond.

I'm not saying Tinder is bad, but maybe for me it's a bit much. I'd like to think that there is something more magical at work in our lives when it comes to the friends we make, and the romantic relationships we partake in. There is more mystery and excitement in spontaneously combusting with someone you met at a friend's party than there is to swiping right to someone on a dating app. So, I guess the only tinder moments in my life for now are the ones created with my friends over a too large bottle of Trader Joe's red wine, a tray of proscuitto and mozerella bruchetta, and a good ole' fashion game of Go Fish.