I am a perpetually single girl whose roommate is engaged to the man she’s been dating since she was 16. She is always begging me to meet someone and start a long-term, loving relationship, so that we can go on double dates, frolic through fields of wildflowers, and live in a world tinted with the rosy pink of new love (or whatever people in relationships do).
So, naturally, last Friday night my roommate and I decided to make me a Tinder account. For those of you who live under a dating-world rock like me, Tinder is basically an app where you link your Facebook account to your profile (so your profile is basically already made for you), and you sift through a ridiculous amount of pictures of eligible bachelors in the local area. If you like a guy based on his pictures, you can swipe right to “like” him. If you don’t like him, you can swipe left to banish him from your dating pool. If both of you like one another, you “match,” and you can start chatting. Easy peasy.
But easy can be deceptive. There is a whole intricate dance you do when you first start surfing Tinder, and I am here to tell you all about it.
- You realize that you have approximately zero attractive photos of yourself on your Facebook account. But you fling the three best pictures you find on your profile and hope for the best.
- As with any other site, you struggle so hard with what you say in your biography. You want to be funny, cute and a little flirty, but most likely you will come off awkward and unrelatable. Ah, who cares, you’re a strong independent lady who doesn’t need a man, right? That’s why you got a Tinder account in the first place.
- You find a surprising amount of men who, for some reason, think that taking pictures sidled up to beautiful women will attract other beautiful women. Which is most definitely not going to work on you.
- And you find guys with puppy pictures. Which most definitely is going to work on you. Because puppies. Who wouldn’t swipe right on these glorious arms cradling this precious baby? It’s like bae squared.
- Sometimes you accidentally swipe right and match with someone whose profile creeped you out- and for a good reason. Trust your gut, girl, you’re probably right.
- Your time spent on someone’s profile goes from a few minutes flipping through all of his pictures and reading his profile to a second-long quick scan of his first picture.
- You are excited about your first match! Could this be the one (you go on your first Tinder date with)? Could this be the guy you take home to meet your parents? You feel amazing!
- But then the guy says something unfortunately sleazy, so you quickly discover that unmatching is a thing you can do.
- You find people you know, and it is going to be weird.
- You match with a guy who uses a cheesy pickup line. And depending on your pun tolerance, you either love it or hate it. The picture below is actually someone I matched with in Auburn whose pictures were all of Batman. Watch out Auburn ladies, the Dark Knight is coming for your hearts.
11. You run into people you matched with (and possibly ghosted on) on campus. And you will feel the most awkward you ever have in your life. (I only had Tinder for like 3 hours, and it still happened. It’ll happen.)
Yeah, I deleted Tinder. I’m not into the hookup culture, but I loved snooping with my roommate on people around Auburn and seeing what they thought would attract other people. But Tinder was not really for me, and maybe it won’t be for you either. But you never know until you try!