{"id":3083,"date":"2016-03-17T09:07:41","date_gmt":"2016-03-17T03:37:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=3083"},"modified":"2016-03-17T09:07:41","modified_gmt":"2016-03-17T03:37:41","slug":"my-tinder-bio-not-here-to-mother-20-somethings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=3083","title":{"rendered":"My Tinder Bio: Not Here to Mother 20-Somethings"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

M<\/span><\/p><\/div>

y <\/span>Tinder<\/span><\/a> profile has three pictures. In the first, I\u2019m performing because duh, the stage increases personal appeal by a factor of 1,000. The second is a \u201ccasual\u201d DSLR-quality party picture. Finally, there\u2019s one in a saree, blowing a kiss at the camera (the saucy shot). This carefully crafted story combines the magic trifecta of flirtation \u2013 sex appeal, approachability, and intrigue. <\/span>\n\nHow am I such an expert? I\u2019ve been doing this a long time.<\/span>\n\nAs a single Indian woman in my <\/span>late 30s<\/span><\/a> on Tinder, I\u2019m a rare breed. I work in young industries, so my peers are a good decade younger. Most of my classmates are married, <\/span>divorced<\/span><\/a>, or on parenting season 2. I am an <\/span>Xennial<\/span><\/a>, the microgeneration characterised only by our confusion as we shuffle awkwardly between the generations that sandwich us, Generation X and Millennials. On the one hand, my experiences find no echo. But on the other hand, I\u2019m (re)writing my own narrative and nowhere is this more fun than in my love life.<\/span>\n\nI first signed up on Tinder in 2014, citing research for my digital business profession. Many of my early matches were friends. There were very few people on the app then, most of them digital explorers like me and this felt like a \u201chaha, look who\u2019s here too\u201d inside joke. <\/span>\n\nThen married male friends showed up. I started looking the other way and swiping left. A few strange encounters later, I added the stock \u201cnot looking for a hook-up\u201d to my bio. The matches immediately dried up. An acquaintance found me, took a screenshot, and sent it to me asking, \u201cIf you don\u2019t want to hook-up, what is the point of you?\u201d Then someone at work said that he had spotted me on Tinder and swiped right. Rolling my eyes, I decided to deactivate the account. <\/span>\n\nThen I reconsidered. More people were getting onto Tinder and it had become the way to meet people. Maybe men have become less <\/span>predatory<\/span><\/a> with better gender ratios. Maybe my experience would be better if I learnt to weed out the unsavoury? Maybe I\u2019ll be able to play the game of swipe left for no, up for hell no, down for in your dreams, and right for your place or mine? <\/span>\n\nOver the years, I\u2019ve learnt that the way to have fun is to not invest emotionally, too much or too early. Mr 30-year-old New Entrepreneur went from fine wine to grammar jokes to \u201cI\u2019ve left something in my room. Why don\u2019t you come up?\u201d and when I declined, he said, \u201cI really like you, why else would I match with a woman your age?\u201d A younger me might have been bullied into succumbing, but my world-weariness had now equipped me to recognise his negging. So, I left. \u00a0<\/span>\n\nTinder makes gender imbalance work in my favour. Hundreds of men want to match with me, regardless of my age, looks, or any other factor there is. This means I get to choose, a novelty for anyone who has experienced oppressive matrimonial rituals. It\u2019s taught me the joys of early and easy exits.<\/span>\n\nAnyway only a handful matches materialise into dates because I am picky about who I meet in real life. Not all conversations lead to dates, some transition to Twitter chats and it seems only mildly interesting that we first connected on Tinder. A date isn\u2019t the final deal or it isn\u2019t the only one. It\u2019s nice to have a few minutes to flirt and chat during a busy day.<\/span>\n\nNowadays I find a breed of recently divorced\/separated\/heartbroken men on Tinder, presumably driven by <\/span>dudebro pals<\/span><\/a> to partake of the \u201chook-up culture\u201d as a cure for their bleeding hearts. These men wear the haunted air of those who\u2019ve learnt late in life about things such as female agency. They swing between clingy (\u201cHello. Hello. Hello. U der? Why not replying?\u201d) to inconsistently flaky. \u201cLong drives\u201d frequently pop up on the profile of these men and it\u2019s tricky trying to explain why I don\u2019t want to get into a car with someone I\u2019ve just met. They tend to get a bit nasty when they encounter a no. One cursed my family for three generations when I disagreed with his politics. This kind doesn\u2019t lack drama.<\/span>\n\nMinus the fairy-tale fantasy, 20-somethings have become legit match possibilities. They come with their own quirks but it helps to have been around the block a few times.<\/span> My age doesn\u2019t seem to dim the ardour of younger men. Their lingo is different but they\u2019re less likely to invite the wrath of the gods. I recognise \u201cu up\u201d as the millennial mating call. But I draw the line at \u201cI\u2019m really into older women\u201d because that\u2019s Indian guyspeak for \u201cPlease be my substitute momma.\u201d The unmatch button comes in handy again, so I let someone else teach an overgrown child how to be an adult. <\/span>\n\n

Over the years, I\u2019ve learnt that the way to have fun is to not invest emotionally, too much or too early.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\nSticking to my guns makes for fewer demoralising conversations and leaves room for others. On a whim, I pinged a match with whom the conversation has been pleasant but not particularly memorable, \u201cCoffee at 4?\u201d We chatted through coffee, tea, sandwiches, and a pizza, covering world politics, our respective romantic journeys, millennial careers, music, and films. The date lasted eight hours and we were both surprised it was past midnight. It was special, yet I can only call this casual intimacy. The experience boosted my mood but we never met again. And this is okay. Tinder taught me that experiences could be transient but still meaningful.<\/span>\n\n\u201cYou Got A Match\u201d still gives me a dopamine hit. As do the minutes before I open the coffee shop door and meet a new person. It\u2019s a spark and that\u2019s magical, even if it\u2019s just a digital logo of a flame. <\/span>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As a single Indian woman in my late 30s on Tinder, I\u2019m a rare breed. I recognise \u201cu up\u201d as the millennial mating call. But I draw the line at \u201cI\u2019m really into older women\u201d because that\u2019s Indian guyspeak for \u201cPlease be my substitute momma.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":271,"featured_media":3084,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[4813,505,6041,1912,6042,1394,6043,1466,408,1051,6044],"class_list":["post-3083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-love-and-sex","tag-30s","tag-dating","tag-man-child","tag-millennial","tag-modern-romance","tag-motherhood","tag-netflix-and-chill","tag-romance","tag-sex","tag-tinder","tag-u-up"],"yoast_head":"\nMy Tinder Bio: Not Here to Mother 20-Somethings<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"As a single Indian woman in my late 30s on Tinder, I\u2019m a rare breed. I recognise \u201cu up\u201d as the millennial mating call. 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