Cheryl

My son in China and me in the city, I got a little bored and put my profile on Zoosk, an on-line singles service. Had joined earlier in the year, but did not put up a profile. It seemed better than Craigslist because it actually had woman in town. Rarely a very local woman on Craigslist. My problem is I have no money to be commuting to visit woman out of town. In fact I have no money to even take a woman out. I am a philosopher currently trying to write a metaphysical theory for the last five years. Taken that long to write four paragraphs and those are tentative. I have to be poor. What I do is so difficult that if I had money, I would distract myself and not do it. So why do it at all? I love the problem.

Revisiting Zoosk, the picture of the first woman up renewed my interest in this site and convinced me of the value of the photograph, and why they were insisted upon by most. However it is of no help to those who do not want to post their photograph on the Internet, and to those who are not necessarily physically attractive. Her username was Olddefty. I filled out my profile, a subject category each day. I reviewed her profile and decided against her. She was too old almost as old as me. The thought passed through my mind, if truth be told. But mainly she was too far away and did not show any real exceptional qualities. What am I looking for? Am I really looking or am I just lonely and bored. I got a number of views and tried to contact someone by the username of Tookie to see if could get a bite, but they required a photo. I had no photos on my laptop. They were on my desktop at home. Putting a photo of myself on the Internet is of something I am adverse. When my son returned he suggested he take a picture of me, which he did and emailed it to me. So I posted it and sent a message to Tookie. Got no answer. But here I thought were possibilities - high hopes.

Back at home after two weeks in San Francisco, my son had a great trip in Beijing. He went to the Great Wall and the Forbidden City. He loved it. For a full week I had the illusion that I might meet someone on Zoosk. Then I took a a look at all the woman, hundreds of them. Did not see anything compatible. Except there was Olddefty the first one I had looked at. She updated her profile and I thought well she is a possibility after-all. I thought regardless of distance, I could spend a week there and a week at home, something like that. So I sent her what they call a 'wink', and I got a message back, "Tell me something about yourself". So I wrote but found that it was not allowed. It was no longer free and I could not even begin to afford to join. So even if I had a shot, would she have been compatible with my future - with the last ten years of my life? It didn't happen, so how could anyone know. One can only assume no. Things are as they should be. But what I learned is a picture is really necessary. I began this quest thinking mind alone was all that was necessary, but learned there must be some physical attraction as well.

It is now been several weeks and I have not been able to see Cheryl for more than a brief moment. She either hasn't been at work or if she is, just before she is to start to check me out someone drags her off, a customer or today the big boss came and got her. Last Friday as I was going into the Senior Center to get a loaf of free bread which I rely on; a hawk flew directly over my head. It was not a regular hawk, like a Redtail or Cooper's Hawk I thought. Looked to me like it might be maybe a Merlin. It went into a tree close by. So when I came out of the center I went over to the tree to see if I could see it, and there it was on a fairly low branch. I got out my binoculars which are fairly small, but excellent vision Nikons, which I always carry at the lake. I watched him for about fifteen or twenty minutes. First off it was kind enough to turn around and face me. It had something dark in its claws. I watched him devour a gopher in its entirety. It would seem a Cooper's Hawk, but if not I consulted my bird reference card and determined that if not, it was a Peregrine Falcon. Wow. Later I saw Cheryl, and about all the time I had with her was to say, "I saw a Peregrine Falcon, the fastest bird in the world, clocked at diving speeds of over two hundred miles an hour, eat a gopher". She said, "ooooooooooooooh that's just the image I needed, yuck". I said, "It's nature", and she said, "It's still yuck", or something to that affect. I've seen hawks carrying snakes in the air, and knock a Dove off my bird feeder. But never have seen a Hawk or Falcon actually eat something. Pretty exciting for me.

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