Love Recruiters

A said he saw a woman at the Erewhon market who was just my type: slim and intelligent-looking. She was so much my type, he said, that he was tempted to approach her and get her number on my behalf.

“Don’t tell me about this now,” I said. “Next time get the number!”

What kept him from approaching, I think, was the awkwardness of acting as a proxy. Few men directly approach women on their own behalf; even fewer will approach a woman on someone else’s. So I don’t blame A for inertia. If I spotted a woman who was precisely his type, I probably wouldn’t play matchmaker either. I don’t have the nerve.

Would that I did! Would that everyone did. It seems incontestable that if men and women briefed five friends in detail about their “type,” and if said friends made regular “proxy-approaches” on their behalf, the resulting increase in erotic and romantic fulfillment among Americans would be enormous. No legislation or government policy could do as much to improve the commonweal. The dreams of revolutionaries would pale in comparison.

I’ll start carrying around pen and paper if you do.

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