drive thru husband order...the new way to pick a mate

"Hi, I'd like to order one husband please."

"Sure what husband package would you like"

"Um… how about package 3 but can we add a side of extra income, please?"

"Of course. Please pull through and we'll have your husband waiting."

Is this what it is going to come to for choosing a mate? Simply ordering the one who fits you best on paper. Taking notes and writing off those who simply don't fit your ideal standard of a life partner? How do you write someone off before you really get to know them? What if the perfect person for you is right in front of your face and you knowingly pass them by?

Should we forfeit passion, romance and love for someone who fits with us perfectly on paper? If I wrote down all the ideal characteristics I wanted in a man, or more so, ones I thought I could not live without does that mean simply because a man met those criteria that he would be the one for me? That he would offer me everything I ever dreamed of? Of course we all have wants and desires, but how soon should you write someone off because we fear they may not stack up to our paper criteria?

At this rate, we might as well just forgo dating completely and have everyone fill out a questionnaire of himself/herself and then match people according to their answers. Would it be a better alternative? Hell, why not we already have tons of websites out there that almost fit this to a tee. Foreign women seeking husbands. Beautiful women seeking wealthy husbands. Forget finding love on your own. Visit a website, create a profile, and the virtual partner of your dreams will materialize before your eyes.

If you are looking for these ideal characteristics in order to maintain the sanity of your mind and spare your heart any pain, you are a fool. Just because someone matches up with what you think you desire doesn't mean that they don't have the capability to shred your heart to tiny pieces. Don't believe me, look around at the divorce rate. Surely these people thought they had found their ideal match when they got married, and now?

When do you say when to someone?

Since when did love become this logical and rational way of picking people? Last time I checked it was about passion, romance and the feeling that this is a person you don't want to live without. Not logically approaching love by basically having them fulfill a questionnaire on who they are at the moment. People change so what is to say that someone that matches your criteria now will still match it in five years. What about someone you wrote off because at this moment they didn't fit one thing you were looking for but in a few years they are your ideal and you have lost out because you wouldn't take that risk. You wouldn't take a leap of faith. There are no guarantees in life, especially not when it comes to relationships.

Twice this year I have been written off in a very short time span. Not because there was a lack of interest but for what I consider to be petty reasons, these guys could not vision a life with me 10 years down the road due to current circumstances. Not definites. Not hardened facts about me that would never change. Not on aspects that had a direct impact on life during these 5 minutes but on items that would come later, down the road. These were not on areas that would never change but on something that was believed to be at this moment, during this five seconds of my life. Should we fail to take a risk on someone simply because they may not want something at this very moment, something that isn't a factor at this moment but may be years down the road? Should we possibly forgo years of happiness with someone on an off-chance?

What if you pass up the perfect person because all you cared about was having the perfect person on paper and thereby hoping to save your heart from inevitable pain? A pain that you can't guarantee won't happen because as great as perfection on paper is, you are forgetting about the inevitable human flaws that make us unique and unfortunately cause us to constantly re-evaluate what we seek in life.

How do you know that what you want this moment in life will be the same desire that you have five years from now? Can you guarantee it?

Should we write off actually getting to know people and instead just have them fill out a questionnaire to find out if they are compatible? Forget about if they can make us laugh, provoke us to look at the world in a different light, enlighten us to things we never knew existed, give us butterflies every time they look at us and make us a better person overall. No, let's forgo all that. Do they make enough money, are they tall enough, fit enough, know for a hardened fact if they want kids, do they live close enough, come from a respectable family background, smoke or do drugs, or will provide sex on a regular basis. Of course these are the more important matters in life. These of course are the things that make us happy. Not a person but facts and trivialities.

Forget taking risks and flowing your heart, let's just do what the paper says. Then we'll know they are perfect and therefore incapable of hurting us.

At what point do you write someone off as not worthy of risking your emotions on?