First meeting is halfway, because it is not fair otherwise
Looking for a man who does not expect us to come to him first
Our rule is that the first meeting happens somewhere between us, whatever that costs both sides. Not our neighbourhood, not yours. It sounds fussy and it has been the single most useful thing we have done.
The reason is that a first meeting is an hour of talking and no decisions. If one person has driven ninety minutes for it, there is a pressure on the evening that nobody names and everybody feels, and twice we have watched a perfectly ordinary drink turn into a negotiation because somebody had spent too much of his day getting there.
Thirty six and thirty eight, the South Bay, three years in. Six first meetings, three of which led to a second, one of which lasted most of last year.
She dates, he is not present and does not want to be, and he reads everything before it is sent because he is a better writer than she is and she has stopped pretending otherwise.
We can host after the first couple of meetings, which removes the usual argument. Not looking for anyone who wants to skip the halfway drink because his place is easier. Not looking for anyone who treats a first meeting as an audition he has to win. Not looking for anyone who cannot manage a weekday, because our weekends belong to other people.
Before the first drink Replying goes through the connected platform, so nothing about you is shared until you decide to share it. Take contact slowly and keep identifying details back until trust is earned. Meet somewhere public the first time, with your own way home from it, and if you are a couple then go together. Tell someone outside it where you are going. Never send money to someone you have not met. And if a post or a reply reads wrong, flag it rather than talking yourself out of the feeling.
Before you answer a post like this
Two people wrote this together, and both of them have to say yes to you. These are the three written for the man on the other end of it.
- What makes a single man read as safe
- Vetting a couple: the screening men skip
- The first meeting: a drink, all three of you