I found him on an online dating site in April 2013.
I am a doctor. At the time I had begun my post graduate degree and I was working in a medical university in Delhi. To tell you the truth, I was not looking for someone to love me. You must be thinking why would anyone join a dating site if not to find love? Actually, I'm not the kind of girl most men fall in love with. Kind of moody and nerdy, bookish and intellectual with spectacles, I'm what you'd call cute.
My problem with men has a long history. All through my life every male I met or talked to, took me for a silly girl, with stupid romantic dreams. Sometimes, I just wanted to scream- "I'M NOT stupid!" In case they realized I have a sound brain, then they were either threatened or bored or both. So I continued, with little hope of ever finding a person I could have a decent conversation with, let alone someone I might love.
So there I was browsing one evening and I found his page. Mr. Bond! By that time, I had already been through dozens of profiles over the past two months, all of them lackluster. As soon as I read his profile, I knew there was something different about him. Yes, cliched but true. Two things caught my eye- One, he was looking for a well-educated and intelligent girl and Two, someone who would stand by him through the good and bad times in life. Straightaway, I decided he might be worth a try.
I emailed him and introduced myself and asked if we could get to know each other. Mr. Bond replied in an equally polite email saying since he lived in USA, it would be difficult to find a common time to talk. A couple of email exchanges later, we added each other to our chat lists.
It was about 10 in the night (in India) when I found him online and tentatively wrote Hi. I got Hi in reply. This was the first time I had ever initiated a conversation with a man on chat and I was completely clueless about what to write next. Honesty is the best policy so I wrote- I'm sorry I'm not very good at this. I don't know what to say next. His reply- Ok then. Bye.
Feeling like a complete fool, I quickly wrote- Wait... Let me try again. So, what do you do? He said- I'm a scientist. What did you study?I asked next. Masters from IIT Delhi, PhD from MIT. Which city are you based in? Boston, he said. Oh nice, I chirped, that's a great city. No reply from him. I shot another insipid question at him about hobbies and spat came the reply- you ask too many questions. I tried to save grace, saying-doctors are curious by nature. Then I waited for him to say something, maybe ask something in return. All of a sudden, a question- Can you call me? Surprised at this turn, I wrote- On your phone?
Yes, he said, call me in five minutes. And so it began.
Next post tomorrow, same time.
