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So, I never expected to find myself at 31 … still single and with no prospects in sight … not to mention a less than stellar dating track record.

I was sure that by 30 I’d be happily ensconced in suburbia, with my husband and the requisite 2.5 kids at some stage of birthing/raising process. Easy enough? Apparently not…

Instead, I found myself approaching 31…still single, and watching an ever-increasing number of friends and family taking that long walk down the aisle and starting their families – even my MUCH younger cousins were attending family functions with their girlfriends du jour in tow. And there I was, solo…everybody’s favourite Aunt Jackie. Now, don’t get me wrong, I had a very full, fun and rewarding life as single person – complete with a network of quality friends and lots of time, freedom and disposable income for travel, completely me-centred shopping (as illustrated by my impressive shoe collection), and nights out with the girls. And still, in my romantic heart of hearts, what I wanted most was to meet that special someone (my own plus one) and get down the business of building a life for two-plus...

And so it was with this mindset that I decided to take the leap into the virtual dating pool Scary stuff indeed! But I figured, what do I have lose? At 31, I was what you would consider a fairly good catch – well-employed, educated, reasonably attractive, and intelligent, with a good sense of humour…and so what if I was still working towards shedding some unwanted pounds (the bane of my existence)? I certainly was not alone in that pursuit…

Without boring you with all the details of my “misadvantures”, I got off to a rocky start with the psychologist-created dating site (the one with the nauseating “success story” commercials) that involves the completion of a lengthy questionnaire that allows you to be matched with others in the top 2 percentile of compatibility with you. All that the considerable membership fee got me was matched with a stream of people I already knew – and through work no less! Talk about awkward!

As for my experience with one of the “freebie” sites, my luck was not much better (but at least I could avoid those I already knew). Aside from the many indecent proposals from those falsely portraying themselves as looking for a committed relationship, my most memorable experience was with a guy obsessed with me being the “older-woman” (with our big 3-year age gap), who ended up standing me up on our 6th date (I know, what was I thinking letting it go that far?) with the lame excuse of having dropped his blackberry in the snow – and this delivered only AFTER receiving a well-worded, yet mature, email from me (3 days letter, no less) advising him to grow up.

But I really can’t complain…in the “numbers game” of online dating, such experiences are only to be expected – many frogs, but not so many princes.
And in the end, it all led me to Martyn (sigh). With 4 months of dating under our belts and still going strong, we are looking forward to sharing some of our experiences and lessons learned with you.

Enjoy!