A Real Story

I was 44, freshly divorced, and my sister basically dared me to try eHarmony because she said I needed something ‘less swipey and more serious.’ The questionnaire took me two sittings and probably ninety minutes total, and by question 140 I was answering things like ‘how important is neatness in a partner’ while genuinely wondering if I was filling out a job application. But I finished it, and three days later I had a match named D., a structural engineer from about forty minutes outside my city.

The guided communication step annoyed me at first because you can’t just message someone right away, you have to answer these multiple-choice prompts back and forth, things like picking which of five statements best describes how you handle conflict. It felt clinical until I realized it was actually filtering out people who wouldn’t bother with it. D. answered every prompt within an hour of me sending it, which told me more about him than a witty opener ever could have.

We met for coffee at a diner near the highway, and he brought his own travel thermos because, in his words, ‘diner coffee is never hot enough by the second cup.’ I thought that was insufferable and charming in equal measure. Four months in, I saw his kitchen and discovered his spice rack was alphabetized, turmeric next to thyme, and I laughed so hard he thought I was mocking him, but really I was just relieved someone else’s brain worked like mine.

We’ve been together two years now, and I still tease him about the thermos every single time we get coffee. The quiz felt tedious while I was doing it, but looking back, I think that’s exactly why it worked.