In the Beginning, There Was Twine ...

Twine, a dating app for smartphones

It all started with an iPhone App called Twine. After having used several other online dating sites over 2.5 years, (and that's a whole other story, well, book, which is not finished yet..) I decided to try out a dating app. Twine uses your Facebook profile, but your photo is blurred out. When you click "New Twine," the app searches far and wide for your Prince Charming. Up pops a blurred photo, an age, a city, and a country. Not a state. It's a good test of your geography skills, and it's a gamble because, for example, there are seven towns across the U.S. called Lexington -- not counting any under the population of 5000. Soooo, you might not immediately know which state the prince (or frog) is Twining from. (You also have the option in settings to choose local, country, or international, depending on how far away you'll go to find a match.) If you decide to "accept the twine," you are then zapped into a text message window, where you begin to chat. After you or the other person is comfortable enough or overwhelmingly curious, one of you can click "Reveal" and the other person must accept to reveal their photo. If they do accept, both photos become clear to see. The hope is that their Facebook profile actually is a photo of themselves and not their dog or car or cartoon. Some have no photo at all.

The part about Twine that I found the most interesting is that you're really starting from nothing more than a location. It's basically the virtual version of walking up to someone on the street that you don't know from Adam and beginning a conversation (only if you do that, you at least can see the bloke.) While some people find this part of Twine to be the most ridiculous, I disagree -- because in this type of situation, you soon discover if your Twine can carry on a conversation or if he sounds like a complete caveman (yeah, no, uh huh...random grunts here and there.) And let me tell you, there are a LOT of cavemen out there.

After a few weeks of random chats on Twine that went no where fast, a new match popped up in "Charlotte, United States." I assumed that was Charlotte in NC (and prayed it wasn't a village in Oregon or something on the other side of the country) and I happen to have family near there (even though I'm a Michigan girl) so I decided, why not?! I sent the generic 'hello' and 'how are ya' (I would give anything to be able to go back and reread our first couple of days of texts but unfortunately the app updated and somehow it deleted old messages.) He answered back, and said he was bartending in an Irish Pub. I answered back, "Are you from there originally?" meaning -- from Charlotte. He answered back that indeed he was -- from IRELAND. Quite honestly, I was very surprised and wondered if he was pulling my leg. (My leg has been pulled so many times through my online dating experiences that I'm stunned it hasn't fallen off yet.) But, come to find out, he really WAS from Ireland, had been in the States 14 years. Needlesstosay I was intrigued. He was chatty, flirty, and delightful. It wasn't long before we revealed photos, and I will say this: Those blue eyes of his sucked me in like quicksand.

Over the next couple of days, we texted through Twine continuously. He asked if I was on "Face the book," which I am, so we became "friends." I had a ball sifting through his photos and posts. Our private messaging went on nonstop and I absolutely LOVED every second of it. On the third or fourth day, I happened to be walking into my parents' house and I was chatting with my mom about him when all of a sudden, my phone rang and his name popped up on my iPhone screen. I was stunned, we hadn't exchanged phone numbers yet...how the?? He was calling me through Facebook! I didn't even know that you could do that! I was SO excited -- and couldn't wait to hear his voice. I answered and there was this warm, friendly, Irish voice on the other end! It was heaven. I don't even remember what we spoke about in that first phone call, but I do remember how distinctly relaxed I felt talking with him, and it felt like we'd known each other for a much longer time than only a few days.

Not long after that, we started video chatting, as well. I still laugh about that -- we are connected on so many virtual levels. Twine, Facebook, Messenger, Skype, FaceTime, text, phone, Viber, Voxer ... It's a hoot because I never know which thing I'm going to hear from him on next! :-) But I can assure you, every time my phone makes a sound, I get butterflies to this day when I realize this gorgeous Irishman is calling me <3