【英语社会】我也要上网交友

Internet dating can be scary. You post a description and photograph of yourself for thousands, if not millions, of people to see, you add details of the kind of person you are looking for and then wait for someone to show an interest. It's a step into the unknown. What happens if your only replies are from dull or unattractive people? Or - even worse - what happens if no one replies at all?

Two people in my office have started internet dating, and both are using www.mysinglefriend.com. For this site, you post your details and ask a friend to write something about you for prospective candidates to read. Our employees have had these comments written by others in the office, so one way or another the entire workforce is participating vicariously in the process.

A word here for those who think that internet dating is beneath them. Why? Is it any worse than any other method? Meeting people introduced by friends as suitable doesn't always work. Take my Most Glamorous Girlfriend. She has met - and married - two candidates put forward by me, and is now (involuntarily) on her own again. As you can imagine, MGG doesn't rate my judgment. She too is now about to embrace the internet.

At least internet dating eliminates some uncertainty. Before you meet someone you will know a lot about them, have exchanged correspondence and spoken on the telephone, and can screen out any dodgy candidates. You can research them on the internet and even take up references, so it is a far more objective way of finding a mate than a random selection after drinking too much in the pub.

In the office we have discovered that while many candidates look promising, some fall by the wayside once they start corresponding. Those who can't spell or who become over-familiar at an early stage get weeded out. The great thing about internet dating is that you needn't give someone your telephone number until you want to, and can hide behind an e-mail address incognito, so you can eliminate unwanted attention quite easily.

I too have recently been internet dating. Like my single colleagues, I have put a lot of information about myself on the internet, together with the qualities I find attractive in a man. This amounts to 900 words a week posted on www.ft.com, rather than www.mysinglefriend.com, which offers at least as much information as a dating profile, and also has a veiled e-mail address at the bottom.

From this I get e-mails from people who share my interests and/or want to meet me. I have never regretted meeting any of my readers, and things that have changed my life for the better (such as taking up shooting) have happened as a result. But meeting people in the flesh is always a bit scary. What if you (or they) don't live up to expectations? You develop an impression of people, as I am sure my readers have of me, and sometimes it is best not to spoil a relationship with harsh reality. I really am an overweight, middle- aged mother-of-three who runs a small business in central London and struggles to manage work/marriage/children.

When I wrote last autumn that I had enjoyed a flight to the grouse moors of Yorkshire in a light aircraft so much that I wanted to do more of it, I got an e-mail from a reader who teaches flying at Exeter International Airport (yes, international), offering to instruct me.

It took six months to find time in my diary to go to Exeter and when I arrived at Aviation South West to meet my internet "date" it was quite nerve-wracking. This was in spite of having done the same due diligence as my single colleagues: I'd corresponded with him, found his picture on the internet, Googled him and looked up ASW at Companies House.

One of my colleagues is about to meet a correspondent from the dating site for the first time, for a drink. She won't tell us when, in case we all turn up to gawp. And she's quite scared about how it will go. But I bet she doesn't spend six hours with him on the first date.

I did. I turned up at 11am and departed at 5pm. In between, we flew a Beechcraft twin-engine aircraft from Exeter to Manchester at 10,000ft, courtesy of Cardiff and Swanwick Military air traffic controls. Manchester is also an international airport but on a slightly different scale to Exeter. As my instructor said: "This is the real thing." Internet dating is the real thing too, no matter how intimidating.

I had a great time with my internet date. He had all the qualities I look for in a man: over 50, passionate about what he does for a living, great company and someone I can learn from. But Mr M needn't worry - he is married. Plus I know that he instructs other, younger and more beautiful married blondes.

We were brought into Manchester in tandem with an Aer Lingus flight, whose pilot had the sexiest Irish-American accent I've heard in ages. After a cup of tea in a plastic cup (there's a distinct absence of Krug in the snack bar adjacent to Manchester School of Flying) we took off, sandwiched between an Emirates 777 and a Dragonair cargo 747. Now, that part of my internet date really was scary.

网上交友能让人惊慌。你得在网上贴一份自我描述和照片，给不说是几百万、也有上千的人看，你还得详细地补充说明你要找什么样的人，然后等某人表示出对你的兴趣。这是迈入未知领域的一步。如果你只收到乏味或没有吸引力者的回复，情况会怎样呢？或者更糟的是，如果根本没人回复，情况会怎样呢？我办公室里有两个人开始网上交友了，他们上的都是www.mysinglefriend.com网站。在这个网站，你得贴上你的详细资料，并请一位朋友写一点关于你的情况，给可能的候选者看。我们的雇员让办公室的其他人写这种评论，所以，全部员工都以这种方式间接参与了这个过程。

在这里，我要对那些对此不屑的人说上一句：有何不可？这种方法哪里比不上其它方法了？去和朋友介绍的人相亲并不总是管用。就拿我的“万人迷”女友说吧。她见过我介绍的两个人选——还嫁给了他们，现在（不知不觉）又再次成了孤家寡人。你可以想象，“万人迷”认为我的判断不怎么样。她现在也准备拥抱互联网了。

至少，网上交友可以消除某些不确定性。在你和某人见面之前，你会知道他很多情况，通过信、通过电话，还可以筛选掉不可靠的人选。你可以上网调查他们，甚至还可以向人查询，所以，这种寻找伴侣的方式，可比在酒馆里喝多以后胡乱选一个要客观多了。

在办公室里，我们发现，虽然许多候选人看起来很有希望，不过一开始通信，有些人就出局了：那些错字连篇或一开始就热情过头的人会被排除掉。网上交友的好处是，你不用早早就把电话号码给别人，直到你想给的时候再给，还可以匿名藏在一个电子邮件地址后面，这样，你就能非常轻松地躲避讨厌的关注。

我最近也在网上交友。正如我的单身同事一样，我把自己的许多信息、连同我认为吸引人的男人标准放到网上。每周我总共要在www.ft.com而不是www.mysinglefriend.com网站贴上900字，这些文字提供的信息量至少与交友简介旗鼓相当，而且在文章末尾也有一个可以遮住你庐山真面目的邮件地址。

通过这个，我收到了与我兴趣相投、以及/或者想和我见面的人发来的邮件。与我的任何读者见面，我都没后悔过，而且，一些事情使我的生活更好了（比如去射击）。不过，亲自去见人总会让人有点慌。如果你（或他们）达不到预期怎么办？你对人会形成某种印象，就像我确信我的读者对我也会有某种印象，有时候，最好还是别用残酷的现实去毁坏相互间的关系。我其实是一个中年、超重的女人，身为三个孩儿他娘，在伦敦市中心经营着一个小公司，为应付工作/婚姻/孩子疲于奔命。

去年秋天我写道，我太喜欢乘坐轻型飞机去约克郡(Yorkshire)美妙的荒野了，我想多飞几次。于是，我收到一个读者的邮件，要给我提供指导。这个读者在埃克塞特国际机场(Exeter International Airport)教飞行（不错，是国际机场）。

过了6个月，我终于在日程表里安排出时间去埃克塞特，当我抵达那里的飞行训练学校Aviation South West去见网友时，情况相当让人头疼。尽管我像单身同事一样对网友进行了“尽职调查”：我与他通信、在网上找到了他的照片、用谷歌(Google)搜索了他的情况，还在英国公司登记局(Companies House)查询了那个飞行训练学校。情况还是非常地伤脑筋。

我有个同事就要去和一个交友网站上的笔友见第一面，一起喝一杯。她不告诉我们时间，防止我们都出现在那里去直勾勾地盯着。她对将要发生的情况相当惶恐。不过我打赌，她一定不会在第一次约会时就和他待6小时。

我却待了6小时。我上午11点到的，下午5点离开。在这期间，我们驾驶着一辆比奇(Beechcraft)双引擎飞机，在1万英尺高空从埃克塞特飞到了曼彻斯特，这得多亏了加的夫和英国Swanwick军事航路的空中交通管制。曼彻斯特机场也是一个国际机场，但与埃克塞特有少许不同之处。正如我的指导者说的那样：“这才够劲儿。”网上交友也挺够劲儿，甭管它让人多么害怕。

我这次见网友非常开心。他具有我认为男人该有的全部特质：50岁以上，对他赖以谋生之事充满热情，是很棒的同伴，而且我还能从他身上学到东西。不过，钱眼先生倒不必担心——他已经结婚了。另外，我还知道，他也给其他一些更年轻、更漂亮的已婚金发美女做指导。

我们与一架爱尔兰航空公司(Aer Lingus)的飞机一前一后地被引导至曼彻斯特机场降落，那架飞机的飞行员有一口我多年来听到过的最性感的爱尔兰裔美国人口音。用塑料杯喝过一杯茶之后（曼彻斯特飞行学校附近的快餐店显然没有Krug香槟），我们返航了，这回夹在了一架阿联酋航空(Emirates)波音777和一架港龙航空(Dragonair)波音747货机中间。那可是我这次见网友过程中真吓人的一刻。

译者/徐柳