Hi there! In case you don't remember me (I'm sure you get a lot of love notes) we worked together back in January! I am writing you today because I am a hopeless romantic looking for love, but not the kind of love that match.com offers... yet.
I am hopelessly searching for my new bestie, my BFF, my partner-in-crime, my some day maid-of-honor. I say hopelessly because last night as I sat on the couch with my two pups watching reruns of Real Housewives of NYC for the hundred millionth night in a row, I started to give up hope. Hopeless is what I felt.
Over a year ago I picked up and moved, all by myself, from Tennessee to Dallas, Tx for a great job offer. I had no doubt in my mind that cultivating new friendships would be a breeze. I mean, I’m bubbly, I’m outgoing, I have a smile that rarely leaves my face and I love to make new friends, how hard could this be?
It was my very first week at my new job when I was already feeling bummed out. The company I was working for consisted entirely of middle-aged men. “Do you think any of these old dudes want to hit up that Topshop event at Northpark with me next Tuesday?” I laughed to myself.
Days turned to weeks, weeks turned to months and I was still shopping solo at Anthro.
I joined my college’s local alum club and would go watch our school’s football game each Saturday with them. By them, I mean my grandparent’s classmates because that is who attends alum watch parties. I remember back in my day at Tennessee……
More weeks to months, and I was still enjoying a glass of happy hour vino, solo.
I signed up for meetup.com, which was everyone's suggestion for me. As I scrolled through mommy meetup after mommy meetup, I finally landed on something called the DFW Nightlife group. Well that sounds like me, I thought, and nervously clicked "I will attend." The event was an art fair on the outskirts of downtown. I had posted a note on the group discussion board,"Hi! I'm sorry, I'm new to this whole thing, so I again apologize if this is a dumb question, but where is it that we all meet? And exactly what time? Is there a leader I need to find?"
Someone posted back and said, "How about 7:30 at that 7-11 on Elm? We can go from there."
Relieved and thankful for a plan, my nerves somewhat subsided. I arrived at the 7-11 at 7:31, and all I saw was a guy laying on a sleeping bag next to a trash bag full of soda cans. As I always do when I'm nervous, I checked my phone, I had 9 notifications from meetup.com.
I kid you not, every message went a little something like, "Not going to make this one. Sorry guys! Have fun without me!" Or, "Running about an hour and 45 minutes late, I'll just come find you guys when I get there."
When the thought crossed my mind to ask the soda can man if he was with the meetup group, I decided the safer thing to do was just go home and watch Real Housewives with the dogs. Solo.
I signed up for meetup.com, which was everyone's suggestion for me. As I scrolled through mommy meetup after mommy meetup, I finally landed on something called the DFW Nightlife group. Well that sounds like me, I thought, and nervously clicked "I will attend." The event was an art fair on the outskirts of downtown. I had posted a note on the group discussion board,"Hi! I'm sorry, I'm new to this whole thing, so I again apologize if this is a dumb question, but where is it that we all meet? And exactly what time? Is there a leader I need to find?"
Someone posted back and said, "How about 7:30 at that 7-11 on Elm? We can go from there."
Relieved and thankful for a plan, my nerves somewhat subsided. I arrived at the 7-11 at 7:31, and all I saw was a guy laying on a sleeping bag next to a trash bag full of soda cans. As I always do when I'm nervous, I checked my phone, I had 9 notifications from meetup.com.
I kid you not, every message went a little something like, "Not going to make this one. Sorry guys! Have fun without me!" Or, "Running about an hour and 45 minutes late, I'll just come find you guys when I get there."
When the thought crossed my mind to ask the soda can man if he was with the meetup group, I decided the safer thing to do was just go home and watch Real Housewives with the dogs. Solo.
I am a blogger. I started Venus Trapped in Mars about a year ago, and it went from a hobby, to a huge passion, to now a gigantic source of new and very real friendships all over the world. Bloggers go out on what we call, “blates,” or blogger dates!
Some girls go on a first blate with a blogger that lives in the same city. Many (yes, I said many) even form such meaningful, and deep friendships with another blogger that they hop on a plane, without giving it a second thought, and spend a week with a girl they only know via the internet. And guess what we all think when we see these cross country blates occur? We don't think they're crazy, nope, not one bit. We think, "Ahh cute! I am so jealous, I can't wait to do this with my blogging bestie one day!"
Thanks to blogging, I now have a bestie to go to anthro with, and a bff to go to happy hour with, but I always want more so I have someone to go to the gym with and someone else to go see the Rangers play the Sox with, and a wing-girl to go to your match.com stir events with! That is the beauty of female friendships, you can never have too many, the search never ends.
This brings me to my reason for writing you today. Females can and do successfully meet other females online. It isn’t intimidating, it isn’t stressful, it isn’t even hard work or a lot of effort; it’s natural.
You see a girl’s picture, you read her bio, she’s flipping hilarious. As you read on, you quickly realize you love the same things, share the same passions. So what do you do? Well, naturally you leave her a comment professing your OHEMGEELove for this chick you didn’t know existed 30 minutes earlier. All of those high school feelings girls seem to hold on to, “oh she won’t like me because *insert dumb reason here*,” just don’t seem to exist on the internet. Before you know it you’re on gchat messaging back and forth, exchanging phone numbers and eventually, meeting face to face! Easy as that.
But here is the problem, unless you’re a blogger, this friend wonderland fairytale doesn’t exist. So, match.com geniuses, with your help, I want to partner up and bring this idea to every single girl with an Internet connection. Sure, I could've just privately emailed you all with this proposal, and I still will send an email with more details of what I'm thinking..... BUT....
BUT if I had simply done that, then how would I have gotten you to scroll down and read the comments below from all of the girls just like me (or maybe nothing like me, sort of like me, older than me, younger than me, with more kids than I have, with husbands, without husbands, with boyfriends, without boyfriends, from Dallas, from Australia, from England, from Bettytonvilletownburg, from Canada, without dogs, with dogs, new to a city, not new to a city) that have made very very real friendships on the internet, thanks to blogging.
BUT if I had simply done that, then how would I have gotten you to scroll down and read the comments below from all of the girls just like me (or maybe nothing like me, sort of like me, older than me, younger than me, with more kids than I have, with husbands, without husbands, with boyfriends, without boyfriends, from Dallas, from Australia, from England, from Bettytonvilletownburg, from Canada, without dogs, with dogs, new to a city, not new to a city) that have made very very real friendships on the internet, thanks to blogging.
(Ok friends... that's your cue, leave a comment with your story. Help yo sistah out!)
