If My Online Dating Profile Told The Truth

Updated 12 years ago, June 18, 2013

I’ve had the same OkCupid profile for the past four years. I swap out the photographs occasionally and tweak the content every so often, just to keep it fresh, but for the most part it’s the same profile I’ve had since I joined the site in 2007. I, however, am not the same person. This is an exercise in self-preservation. If my profile were updated to reflect reality, it’d be safe to assume that my inbox action would be halved, if not completely nonexistent. Here’s what my profile would say, if I were keeping it really real.

My self-summary

I drink too much, too early. When I’m not drinking, I’m working, though oftentimes I do both simultaneously.

What I’m doing with my life

Acting out via self-destructive behavior despite knowing better.

I’m really good at

Isolating people. Making excuses. Pointing out what I’m bad at. Ignoring emails and text messages. Taking the subway. Going to bed at extreme times such as 8 PM and 6 AM. Making deviled eggs. Reading half of a book and then forgetting to finish it.

The first things people notice about me

Too busy looking at my iPhone to notice people noticing me; this is probably what people first notice about me, actually.

Favorite books, movies, shows, music, food

This feels too vague; I think most of my interests are conditional and/or fleeting and lack the prestige the word “favorite” implies. That being said, “All For You” by Sister Hazel is my favorite song of all time.

The six things I could never do without

Probably just the internet and brunch, I recently had Monterey Jack cheese in a Bloody Mary and it seems like something I could never do without.

I spend a lot of time thinking about

Work and money, if I will die before I pay back my student loans, when I’m going to start feeling ‘old,’ the ways my body will potentially fail and/or disappoint me, serial killers, what it would be like if I were a forensic psychologist, if I should just keep going to school until I die so that I never have to pay back my student loans, what kind of people debt collectors are, how homeless people became homeless, what I actually want vs. what I think I’m supposed to want vs. what I pretend to want.