As a social wallflower who moved three hours from my hometown back in January and still hasn't made any substantial social connections, I held my nose and signed up for an online personals service a couple of months ago. By and large, it hasn't been productive as the young ladies who capture my interest haven't been returning my e-mails while those who have contacted me have not been my type. That all changed last week upon reading the profile of "Abbey" who instantly won me over with her charm, intelligence and beauty. E-mails were exchanged, leading to a lengthy one-night exchange of instant messages. I could not have been more excited. Talking to this girl, it was almost as if the word "soulmate" was flashing in bright red letters on her IM box. Yet something about her story just didn't add up to equating with a lifestyle that is at least marginally conventional, which I consider reasonably important for a romantic prospect.
A date was set at a neutral location for Saturday evening (last night) and her entrance evoking mixed feelings on my part. Superficially, she wasn't quite the dreamboat I had envisioned based on her photo and idealistic imagination but she was undeniably attractive nonetheless. By more serious personality measures, she really impressed. She was by far the most intellectually astute person I've ever met in person, walking circles around any and every topic we covered, and in ideological alignment with me about 90% of the time. I was into her, even though the love-at-first-sight sexual chemistry was not as explosive as it had been in our online chat. But awkwardness and huge red flags emerged for me right away based on the evasiveness of her response to my questions about what kind of work she was doing in this new city she had just moved to two months earlier. As the evening went on, it became clearer and clearer from her inadvertant clues that my worst suspicions were right and she could apparently sense I was putting two and two together.
We left our comfortable berth on a sofa at the wine bar and proceeded to a couple of chairs in the corner where she made it official, professing that her career was as an "escort". She was not attempting to rein me in as a client on our date, which I never sensed. She was legitimately making the rounds on the local dating circuit and pursuing a potential relationship. For the next hour, she proceeded to give me a detailed description of how she came to arrive at this profession, how her family feels about it, and how she maintains a traditional social life and her academic studies outside of this profession.
I smiled and nodded, being as courteous as possible, and being careful not to say anything that could be construed as judgmental and would provoke a glass of wine being splashed into my face, but nonetheless conveyed through my body language that I would never be able to condone that lifestyle by my significant other. She got the hint and seemed to be a little insulted that I had lost interest in further romantic conquest, even though I didn't specifically spell that out. The evening ended cordially, but abruptly. We made standard assurances of keeping in touch, but it's unlikely that we will. I'm pretty certain there would be further dates on our horizon had she not read my disinterested mind, so I can't help but feel a little bit bad about this.
So what do you guys (and gals) think? Would you be able to accept a scenario like this for your significant other if you connected with him/her at every other level? Am I out of line in writing her off because of this? Can one be open-minded about such matters as it applies to society in general, but not necessarily be hypocritical if they don't wish it in their own personal sphere? Looking forward to some feedback because I don't believe my response was out-of-line given the circumstances.