George is in his early 40s, divorced for a little over a year, and has a 12 year old son, Danny. A few months ago George signed up on Yahoo Personals. He created his profile. He searched for women that lived near his home and sent messages to several of them.

Not one of the messages George sent was acknowledged. Not even a “Thanks, but no thanks.” Nothing. “How rude,” he thought. Meanwhile, he began getting messages from women that had read his profile. Notably, several of them were from countries from the former Soviet Union. (Let’s call them Russian women.) Initially, he replied to every query he got.

Before long he had developed a pretty regular exchange of email with two of the Russian women, Nadia and Olga, and was sending “Thanks, but no thanks” replies to any new queries he got. Eventually, he began ignoring any new queries. [The last time I talked to him, he still felt that was rather rude behavior, but he recognized how one might get overwhelmed by trying to reply to every message individually. An automated reply may be in order, but he didn't have that in place either.]

Anyway, both Nadia and Olga are in their mid 20s, working in jobs that let them support themselves, never married, and dissatisfied with the chauvinistic attitude they find in Russian men. They wrote frequently. They exchanged photos. And within a few weeks, both wanted to come visit George in the U.S. They were going to have time off from work within a few weeks. Of course, tickets are expensive. Visas are expensive. Local and national officials demanded amounts in excess of the “official” fees. They’d really like to come visit, but it was just going to cost so much….

Now, I readily admit that I am probably more cynical than the average person. George was trying hard to give these women the benefit of any doubts he had. My immediate suspicion is, if these emails are even really coming from Russia, there’s no way to tell whether they’re coming from an Ivan rather than a Tasha. There’s no practical way to verify the age or identity or location of the correspondent at all within the limits of email or Yahoo Personals. So, for the sake of the story, I’ll continue to refer to them as Nadia and Olga….

But George needed to trust what he was reading. He made it clear to both women that they were not the only person he was corresponding with. He stated his belief that, no matter how well they got along in email, he knew it would take more than that to develop any kind of deeper, long-term relationship. He felt a closer connection to Nadia and discouraged Olga from considering a visit at all.

Meanwhile Danny (remember Danny, the 12 year old son, and you know how 12 year old boys are…) expressed his curiosity about his dad’s dating prospects. I don’t remember if he told me exactly how it came up, but Danny is starting to be curious about everything related to females. So George told him about the email he had been exchanging. He showed Danny the photos. And he told Danny that Nadia wanted to come visit.

“So,” Danny asked,” why doesn’t she come visit?”

“That’s a long way to travel,” George explained, “and the trip is very expensive. Even if we let her stay here, there are international airline tickets, tourist visas, and lots of other little costs that add up.”

Danny dug in his pocket and came up with a dollar. He handed it to his dad. “I think you should tell her to come visit.”

So George started arranging a visit from Nadia. He sent her some money. She had a ticket, she said, but there was a delay on the visa. The consulate wanted more money. George asked her for the details on her ticket and the case number on her visa application. They went back and forth and he never got all the details he wanted. He contacted the embassy. They could check on her application if he had the case number. All he had was her name and city. They didn’t find a record of the application.

In all fairness, she may be telling him the truth and trying to protect her own privacy. I don’t think so. But George still says, “If it’s meant to be, something will work out.” I never asked him how much money he sent, but he did offer that it was less than he might have spent if they had been dating the last couple of months. I keep thinking about this exchange from The Big Chill:

Michael: I don’t know anyone who could get through the day without two or three juicy rationalizations. They’re more important than sex.
Sam Weber: Ah, come on. Nothing’s more important than sex.
Michael: Oh yeah? Ever gone a week without a rationalization?

Posted by tvansant