This site like all dating sites is nothing more than a micro-chasm of society. Having expectations beyond interaction with other humans will be a disappointment & frustratingly un-productive!
Involve yourself in conversations send notes of interest to those who catch your eye and be aware that many here are either in deep denial about their singleness or deceptive in their presentations of themselves. Remain honest and open and remember this...ALL relationships that are healthy are born out of compromise and want....not NEED & beauty!

Thanks Sally!
Your kindness did not go unappreciated.
There are a lot of people here & out there who have made the same mistake jumped ship & landed in the drink only to find out it takes two dedicated spirits to make any headway against the tides of life. People allow themselves to be distracted from what is real by the inundation of "more, better & richer", the media in all of its forms blasts away at reality with our complicity, we are not satisfied & the purchase of their product will make us feel better.
A simple example, we all need a car, but everyone assumes they need a newer, faster or more reliable one. FALSE! What we need is to learn how to care for that which we have, cars only wear out when we have neglected them & not maintained their tired parts. What we are trying to do by buying NEW all the time is present an image of ourselves that is a mirage, we are never better for driving newer nor do people look up to us because we did, they may envy our income but not the payments or the added costs of insurance.
When we have a partner who is as dedicated as we are to finding depth in a relationship are we not satisfied? If we have compromised the qualities we sought in a another person we wind up with a compromised relationship.
And we compromise mainly out of expediency & comfort & loneliness...& peer pressure. Guys find make-up queens who look marvelous because they want to be envied by all the other guys & women find guys with money who can BUY them crap to continue the charade. We would all say we would rather beauty & money over almast anything else....until after years of self loathing we find ourselves older and poorer & unfulfilled & bitter, because we bought what our peers have told us was the best & denied what we knew in our hearts.
Intimacy gets confused with sex, sharing gets confused with purchasing & togetherness gets lost along the way because it takes effort to maintain a relationship & the world tells us every minute of every waking hour that we can BUY happiness quicker & easier than we can make it ourselves, work hard and buy your way to happiness is the biggest lie foisted on us.
If all things that they told us had the value they sold us on we would not be facing a depression.
This might sound simplistic but the ONLY things of true value are sharing life, love and our futures together, and to do that one MUST find a person smart enough to know the same truth.
In my marriage we were as happy with corn flakes as we were with filet mignon...it is JUST food! It does not make us better or enrich our lives to spend more in pursuit of what others tell us is their standard of excellence, we have to find our own. This site is a dump of unmet expectations, broken hearts and abused trusts and all for one reason, we gave into the lies others sold us or that we sold ourselves.
And the tragic thing is that if given the chance at a "golden relationship" most of us would return asap to the ways we failed in the past, because it is easy!
True love is never easy in the present but if you give it you everything & your partner does the same, when you look back it WAS easy, all you had to do was give w/o expectations, be honest and realize that this relationship is all you really have of value. What is more valuable than a partner who is honest, loving & willing to do anything to continue to be so? Money and crap all lose their value over time, on your deathbed do you want riches, crap and the envy of people who mean nothing to you or do you want the comfort of an equal who has returned with interest all that you have given?
We have learned to seek stimulation over satisfaction, money over time and crap over fulfillment of the heart and in doing so we have lost our way in life....and we find ourselves here searching with broken hearts for what we have forgotten was important LOVE & companionship until death.
"We " are all that are important in life, "we" working together to better "US". My wife & I believed we could build our relationship 1% a day....and at the end of the year we were 365% better off for it, by staying focused on the relationship,
just 1% a day...how damned tuff is that to accomplish?
Yet few actually ever do that much...why? distraction, selfishness & desires are the enemy!
We give all of our time to employers & none to each other in comparison!
We are more interested in presenting an enviable image than we are in being better, we have bought the lies of advertising & media consultants wholesale and where are they now that the truth is overwhelming?....selling more lies to those younger and dumber than we were who buy them at a greater rate than we did.

Sally what we all need is to stop fooling ourselves and those around us into believing we are what we project and just become our true selves...people who need love and a companion who seeks the same at ANY COST.
No one has EVER been able to steal a truly full heart because one that is full cannot be swayed into "better" or richer or prettier because a truly full heart is worth 1000 times more than all of those other things combined.

Give this a thought, do the blind care an iota about beauty or image or envy? Why is their satisfaction in life so much greater as a whole than those of us with sight?
Because they "see" from the heart and are not distracted thru envy or peer pressure, we could all learn a lesson from them, instead we ignore them and pity their existence, poor us eh?

The age was changed and I await your input..!

Hey Roco, that's a fair question.
This is the NON-Reader's Digest version (fair warning to the whineypeople who think they HAVE TO read everything that gets posted and respond like it was THEIR forum)

The deal is that I moved in with my 5th grade sweetheart when I was 19, we stayed together for another 6 years, married for 4, she succumbed to the female urge to reproduce & rather than have kids or deny her of the privilege we decided to set each other free. The week I mentioned it at work a gal came up to me & said she was interested in me until she found out I was married, now that the situation was about to change she wanted to make sure I was aware that she was interested.
We started dating during the 3 month wait for the divorce to become final. "B" moved out on a sunday after the divorce & "M" moved in that monday, for the next 15 years it was the time of my life. We strived daily to become a single spirt instead of 2 people married. We became a "ring & pinion" the sum of the 2 of us was greater than 1+1. We never worried about money only about satisfying the needs of each other in every regard, she gave up a career in front of the camera in order to be with me more. We had no children and we traveled the world for a time, established 4 business together, 1 of them sponsored a national TV program in the 80's & was an advertiser on another on the same network.
We took lessons & got our SailPlane licenses, we worked 7 years 26-42 weekends a year to help a young man reach his goal of becoming a national racing champion, we raised 4 wonderful dogs and bought 2 houses together, moved across the country and we were the envy of all of our friends & associates because of the deep love we expressed for each other and the smoothness of our relationship, people said we acted like newlyweds for 15 years. I have never seen 2 people function like we did, we set our own standard.
What happened? She was killed by a speeder who ran redlights, I surrvived.

So my "dating" experience is between zero and none especially in the past 15 years.
Dating is like the anticipation of going to an amusement park, once you arrive you forget all of the stuff you've been occupied with and concentrate on the long term experience.

And thats why my ineptness is like a tidal wave, I've never had to do the legwork most do in search of a mate, partner, wife & best female friend.....

I know how to drive the car, make it run fantanstic & how to get the most milage out of it, I just have no experience in opening the damn door to the thing!

You see my problem, the one I sought help with,you wasted your time & effort to respond & you are willing to be shallow but not helpful and then you wish me the best of luck, coming from you & considering how you have treated me, I am sure you must know how special to me your sentiment really is.
Clearly you rose to the height of your abilities & resource for the occasion.
I would really like to return the favor, but none was ever offered,or given we both lost any potential value in the exchange.
I am sure you found the satisfaction you usually do in the attempt to not do something for someone who asked for help.

THERE you go...info that has value !
I am guessing that people read what they want to read into a profile. I hesitate at being more specific but am willing to take your advice and clarify. Thanks!

I can understand why the cover photo & the one of Mohave would tend to be seen that way, I explained they are older & included a recent one.

Could it be that I am too direct, wanting to cut to the chase and skip all the meaningless chitchat that is forgotten once the inner person emerges?

For a farmboy from nowhere, I have done rather well by myself, made friends with what some would call heroes and traveled farther than most do...is the mention of those things intimidating?
I am a faithfull guy who was very satisfied in a very long marriage, never strayed once, and was a loving caring husband. Our friends all looked up to our relationship as a role model and mentioned it frequently. The marriage ended due to her death in a car accident, the result of a speeding red-light runner.
What I am looking for is a woman who is ready to meet a guy who is faithful, independent and well rounded with several skills interests & drives and who is thin and enjoys traveling at a pace that entails more than just saying"i've been there".

Ah now that you detailed the encounter I do recall it!

Brevity is not one of my best suits, NON-detailed explanations, in my book, is one sure way to be misunderstood, so I make a point of clarification up front.
When people find my missives long or too detailed & then make comments I assume they had the abilities to view the length of the post ahead of time and had the choice to read or not, those that do and then complain about the length are being either flip or snarky as if I wasted their time when it was their choice to read something that did not apply to them.
sorry!
And if you dont read the digest & never have how can you base a statement on its value or contents or audience?

Back to the subject.....
where does the bio come off as arrogant?

I am curious as to what exactly I have posted that would lead you to believe that I am arrogant, conceited, opinionated and an a$$hole..?
You opinion is valued but of more import is the reason!

I stated what I have done with my life, what type of person I am in search of and NOT interested in.

Life and love are serious, maybe I am not being shallow enough or need to appear as not knowing what I am looking for?

Time is far too precious to invest in frivolousness, I tend to be more direct in my approaches, not wanting to waste time with those who are not as serious about locating a mate.

I could not care less about a hook-up or casual relationships.


Details would be oh so helpful!
opinions are great but only when backed up by reasoning or insight into the decision.

I do not recall the incident sorry. I didn't come here in search of humor which is probably why I missed the joke.

Well, I appreciate you input & thanks but there must be a reason why I get no interest from the women who seem to be asking for my type of assets & dedication.

I am beginning to think women say they are looking for one thing when in actuality they WANT something entirely different.

I have not gotten a single reply to any message I have sent.

Guidance needed here folks, what or where is the drawback?

How old do I actually look and what should I delete or add?

Now THAT was funny and HOT!

Looking for simplistic answers is a fools game.
If the details and intricacies are beyond you abilities to comprehend let it pass w/o a snarky comment.
If that was "humor" & not snark your funny bone is either malformed or needs a tune-up.
Readers digest indeed!
How old are you 75? I mean WHO reads that rag that isn't old, lame or in a doctors office?
If you were as hot as you thought, you would have asked for the Cliffs Notes version.

You said something that gave him an expectation OR you said a lot of little things he read as HINTS plane & simple, he was looking for them.
A lot of people will assume you are interested in them if you spend time with them & make a statement like "you're cute" or your picture is.
Some hang on each & every tiny thing that can be seen as complementary then thru-out a conversation they add them up thinking that each one was a "hint" that you are interested.

THEN when they return the hints & you don't pick up on their message they will assume you are a tease & they become rude, they do it because they are hurt by the rejection that they see unfolding...1 minute you appear to them to be courting something deeper then all of a sudden you are not. They are either hurt & do not recognize where the comm. failure occurred OR they misinterpret the time you spend with them as approval & pursuit, when you make your intentions known after a few inappropriate comments they assume you have been wasting their time or teasing and they want YOU to hurt in the same degree THEY are.
One has to be VERY clear about why there is an engagement in the 1st place.
IF you stated at the intro, " You are cute and nice BUT I am ONLY talking because I have time on my hands & I am NOT looking for anything but conversation".....they would likely not stick around or they would at least know your exact intentions.
I wouldn't spend a all night talking with someone who did not interest or stimulate me in some valuable way & if I did have a long conversation & I kept getting hint they wanted more than I did from it I would call them on each infraction of the expectation...gently. Remember we ALL have feelings that can be dented or hurt and that expectations are BUILT 1 brick at a time.
Be careful NOT to raise anothers expectations of your intentions, do not be coy when attempting to be funny or sweet & do not say things that are "lead-ons" unless you mean them. Women like to HINT so that men discover what they want AND men are very keen on searching for hints when they are searching for the relationship they want or expect.

Rack it up to miscommunication & don't get all bent out of shape when it happens because it happens in the best of LTR's after decades of togetherness, you blow it off as an error on both parts and next time you are more clear in your intentions or speech. Simple deal, if it gets ugly or abusive ONLINE, you have an OFF button & if that isn't sufficient there is BLOCK and REPORT to use as tools to end it.

Then there are the imbalanced...
Getting you bothered is actually some yo-yo's goal!
It is a way they can feel/gain a sense of power over you & because they are miserable to begin with their goal is to make everyone feel the way they do, it IS a type of companionship, twisted yes but by doing so it puts all in the conversation at the same level, just don't fall for it and if you find that you already have, STOP the conversation abruptly w/o warning or explanation, afterall you OWE them nothing!
Being clear with your recipient is the best way to avoid that which you experienced, in the beginning and throughout a conversation.
One mistake on the part of another is small potatoes in the overall scheme of things, blow it off & move forward & be smarter for the experience. Life is a classroom of learning & every nice guy & Bozo has something to teach you worth learning whether you enjoy the "lesson" or not..!

AND remember we ALL deserve what we NEED, it is just that some (actually MANY) confuse what they NEED with what they DESIRE, and that is a serious mistake for anyone to make.

GO find that person that makes your heart sing & your knees quiver, they are searching for YOU for the same reasons!

...and don't build a callous on your spirit because of a single incident, that only restricts & damages YOUR potential satisfaction in life & not theirs.

I think it has more to do with the difference women place on what they want vs what they desire and I frankly do not see the difference!

Any number of times I have heard the same line "I only want a guy who is in love with me, who is gentle and has confidence, then when you open up and admit that, they are gone before you can say " hey WAIT!"

Stating what one WANTS does not translate into
"what I will date or be serious with" too often it seems.

I am just "mostly" here tonight, not "all" here.
And if I wanted to be all here, in actually the best I could muster would only be "virtually all here".
AND, if I could find someone I wouldn't be here at all!!