in search of mr right

Dating and mating (generally thought of as one entity) is not a game; it's a war zone. 

In that metaphoric battlefield, I'd get both a medal of valor and a purple heart for wounds sustained in combat action against hostile forces. And that wouldn't even be an exaggeration. My injuries are deadly--several fatal gunshot wounds from cheating, lying sonsofbitches; shrapnel trauma from explosive break-ups; and fractured bones from too many blind, head-over-heels falls.

Then I'd be honorably discharged, of course. Dismantled, disarmed, decommissioned. In an ideal world, I would walk into the sunset, enveloped in a pink halo of wisdom and self-discernment, trailing fairy glitters to the soundtrack of Adele's 'Don't You Remember'. But wait! I am mixing my metaphors.

The thing is, in the age of the millennials and iGens, nobody walks peacefully into the sunset anymore. After getting patched and bandaged from the damage in the war zone of dating and mating, the Singles Army (version 2016) must jump right back into another fierce, savage battle to bring home the target--Mr. Perfect Match (with whom one can walk hand-in-hand into the sunset and kiss in silhouettes to the tune of Freddie Mercury's 'We Are The Champions').

No. I'm not making fun of finding and saving Private Ryan--er--Mr. Right. In fact, I already have the profile of My Perfect Match carefully tattooed on my heart and on my mind. He is a collage of my assorted longed-for personality types that will probably scare away a seasoned shrink. But hey, who's to say that one person's 'crazy' is not another's 'perfect'? My friends and I even have a name for this potential P.O.W. We call him Adam--you know, Frankenstein's creature. Prince Charming and Mr Right are so old school and possibly neurotic. Frankenstein's Adam, however, is much more in touch with his (literally) conflicted body parts. 

So in the search for this target, I have pawned my silver medals of courage to buy the obligatory fighting shoes--metallic stilettos. Just the right dose of tacky and sexy to make the enemy yield to his wild fantasies of being stepped on and trampled by an amazon dominatrix. And I am not alone, either. The road to Happily Ever After is paved with high heels and chicken soup. Our name is Squad, for we are many.

The only problem is--I am disabled. Almost literally disarmed. You see--I can't see. I am myopic, I cannot wear contacts. and glasses make me dizzy. 

In the war zone of potential dates and mates, eye contact is the B-2 Stealth Bomber. 

The only contact I can muster with clear vision is somewhere near my elbows or my forehead or my knees--a bit too creepy in a real-life situation! 

This has cost me once or twice already, mind you. Once, in a sleepy cafe, a guy just suddenly sidled up to my seat as if we had an understanding to go forth and multiply. Up close, he wasn't bad looking. But there was this  leering familiarity in the way he ogled me that made me long for the protective comfort of a hammer. 

"Do you know him? Why is he so friendly?" I whispered anxiously to my companion.  

"Are you kidding me? You've been eye-effing that creep for the best part of an hour! What did you expect?" 

To my horror, I realised what I had just unwittingly done.

"Jezeez! I thought I was looking at a bobbing minion balloon! It was a MAN???"

He was wearing a rather large yellow hoodie and was headbanging to the music in his head. To my blurry eyes, he was a rather cute balloon moving in the shadowy cafe which sort of amused me. And so he was nodding at me and smiling at me and I was staring and smiling back in the age-old ritual of a clinched deal. 

My friend and I barely escaped without black-eyes.

I have stories of other such fails that, if not succeeding in landing me a date, at least gave me and my friends a stitch from laughing so hard or running so fast. All because I can't effing see who I am looking at, who is eyeing whom, or what I'm nodding to. 

So, yeah. I have decided to quit the army and leave that war zone. It's too much trouble. Nowadays when I go out, I fix my gaze on either my drink/my food/my friend, or on a safe object like the wall or the water dispenser. Never mind turning on the laser beams in search of Adam.

Perhaps he will find me instead. So then he can sit right next to my elbow where I can see very, very clearly a kindred soul sewn together from ragged pieces that were never designed to fit... but do.