The Beginning of the Dating Adventure

 A week ago my friend Julia and I got on a Skype call to set up our dating profiles.

We ended up talking about books for two hours, and then remembered we actually had a task to complete. After frantically scribbling down each other's book recommendations, we downloaded the Hinge app and got started.

Setting up the profile overwhelmed me slightly. Hinge requires six photos and three prompt responses before they will consider your profile complete. They had a list of about twenty prompts to answer as a way for you to share a little of your personality. I chose the following prompts:

1. I want someone who... (will make me laugh, has ambition, is kind, and doesn't mind that I will probably always love my cats more than them)

2. My most irrational fear is... (a killer whale coming out of my closet to murder me)

3. Something about me that surprises people is... (I have ten tattoos)

After filling out my demographics and preferences, I was officially on Hinge.


Since Hinge has a smaller dating pool than some of the larger apps like Tinder, it took longer to start getting matches. After two days I only had two matches (one of whom I ended up unmatching based on the brief conversation we had and the realization that he lied on his profile about his political alignment), and so I decided to switch out one of my prompts for a new one as an experiment. 

New Prompt: Let's make sure we're on the same page about... (trusting science, caring for the people around us, and believing the world can be improved)

Sure enough, suddenly I was getting more likes and matches on my profile. 


Over the last few days I've been chatting mainly with three people: a lawyer, a photographer, and an epidemiologist. While I'm a long way off from being ready to actually meet any of them (I decided I have a strong rule that before I meet anyone off the app we must chat regularly for three weeks first), it is exciting to know I have started on a new adventure that will hopefully lead me to something - or someone - great.




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