'An open letter to the Tinder date who used me for sex.'

To my Tinder date who wanted a “casual” relationship, 

Let me start from the beginning. As all Tinder interactions begin, we both swiped right.

You began the conversation with “I like your dimple”.

We spoke for two weeks before going on our first date.

We met in the city and wandered the streets looking for a bar. Instead we found a bowling alley. So that’s what we did. I had fun even though I was appalling at bowling.

The conversation was easy and I felt so comfortable. Leaving the bowling alley, we stopped to listen to a busker on the side of the road. You wrapped your arms around me. I smiled.

We sat in a park and talked, you leaned over and kissed me. We went to a rooftop bar and admired the view. You proposed we head back to your car where we could make out in private, because we both lived an hour away in two opposite directions from the city.  

We’d walked a fair distance by this point so we caught a train to your car. It was close to 3am when I rested my head on your shoulder. You put your arm around me and pulled me closer, I wrapped my arms around you. Our limbs intertwined perfectly and interlocked like two puzzle pieces.

When we got to your car we were both jittery with excitement. We kissed passionately, and we explored each others bodies as much as we could with our clothes on. We ended up having oral sex. I jumped in an Uber in the wee hours of the morning.

We texted back and forth quite a bit from then. But while I replayed all the moments of conversation and hand holding from our date, you kept reminding me of how good the end of the night was.

You had a busy schedule between work and study so the next time we met I picked you up from the airport, we went for a quick trek along a nature trail and found ourselves back in the car, fooling around.

Driving home, guilt washed over me. Had I just met up with a guy for a quickie? Did he like me, or did he like my abilities?

The next weekend you cancelled on our brunch date, with a follow up comment: “I’m shattered we don’t get to fool around this weekend”. My heart sank. It wasn’t “I’m shattered we don’t get to see each other.” You were “shattered” that you weren’t getting sex.

Not being able to hold my tongue, I called you out on it. You proposed that we keep things casual, that you didn’t want anything serious. But I liked you. So I agreed, despite every good sense in my body, I agreed.

I told myself that I’d enjoy it just as much as you did. That I’d be able to do this without catching feelings. The feminist in me roared. My sexuality was not inextricably linked to my heart. I could be like Sex and the City’s Samantha.

But when deciding on a place and time we struggled. We both had hectic schedules and a two hour distance between us.

Then you said you saw me as a “sex toy”.

You didn’t want to talk when we met up. Even though it hurt, I thought to myself, well I’m going to use you as a sex toy as well. You told me you’d lost interest in me, and it hurt a bit more.

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You travelled a lot, had a very large group of friends, and was very Instagram-able. I on the other hand never used Instagram and hadn’t travelled in the last two years. I loved books, art, TV shows and movies.

I was apparently not living my life. I wasn’t interesting. After much back and forth over text you finally said you could not be “bothered” to see me even for sex. I was enraged. I had let go of so much of myself in that exchange, reducing myself to a sex toy only to face rejection again.

So dearest Tinder date, now, nothing about you amazes me. You are the product of social media and porn. You are a sexually frustrated man child, who thinks too much about how others see him on social media and not enough about how they perceive you in actuality.

Your character epitomises every ugly trope of the internet world. I should have known that my adult braces, goofy smile and dark skin would not have fit in your Instagram story.

From here on, I vow never to date a man like you again.