Coping Devices

Trying to find a mate at thirty plus can be difficult business but Emily Bracken has ten innovative strategies to deal with the problem. Desperate situations (if being single at over thirty can be thus described) probably warrants such desperate measures.

What I enjoyed about several of her ideas is how she combines the off-the-wall with the almost plausible. Posting a fictive missed connection on Craigslist is not something that would require severe mental derangement to consider doing and yet it does not count among the most "normal" things in the world to do.

In the early days of me turning suddenly single, I felt a certain depth of despair and urgency to correct my situation. I had to meet someone I could spend the rest of my life with - and this had to happen in short order. Since I was already a mother, the biological clock was not a factor - but time ticked uncomfortably loud all the same. Sometimes that state of mind led me into situations that I would not be able to explain or rationalize today. The daily grind has this amazing power of blunting the intensity of pain and longing until you almost forget that it exists.

I remember a girlfriend once exhorting me to go grocery shopping on Friday evenings because many other singles are likely to be there too. Maybe I would bump into "the one" in the fresh produce section. What better indicator of compatibility than a common taste in zucchini.Her idea sounded as far-fetched to me as some Bracken's do but she swore by the efficacy of it. It is entirely possible that folks have done "wackier" things to meet someone and have had success.