From everything you've said in the past, I don't blame you for wanting to be absolutely sure of a man's character before taking a risk again with someone and getting emotionally hurt again. Makes sense.

@TomMcGiverin it has turned about to be a pretty effective litmus test for weeding out people who don't deserve to be trusted, as well.

@Deb57 I'm glad that it has. It makes sense that patience regarding sex and trustworthiness would go together because they both involve whether a person respects your boundaries and values you as much as themselves.

I think you got it right.

Wise and eloquent as always. I totally agree with you, Larry. I have only been in platonic and intimate, too sensitive to do FWB, but make no judgement or have anything against consenting adults who do FWB.

Great photographs!

I feel your pain and can relate. I can't count the number of times on dating sites that I have messaged a woman soon after they join, missed their first round of men that they replied to (no doubt because my main profile pic wasn't good-looking enough, so they passed me up for the better-looking men who messaged them, not even reading my first message), traded messages with, and then met in person or went out with. And then later, when they finally got around to replying to my later message, following up with them and telling them I was still interested in them, they cry me a river about all the bad experiences they had with other men (undoubtedly ones who were better-looking and more impressive than me in their profiles) on that dating site and how they are leaving the site soon and giving up on meeting any more men from the site, etc. As if that is supposed to make me feel better that I got passed up by them when they were still interested in meeting men for dating and to make me feel it was "nothing personal" that they don't want to get to know me then or meet me.

Small consolation and more like a slap in the face, to be told that you're never going to get a chance to prove yourself worthy or compatible with that woman because you never measured up enough to make the first cut with them, so you have to accept that they passed you up then and are now not interested in seeing if you might have been a match for them if you had made the first round cut. I know, I sound like a pathetic doormat, but that is the fate of men who are average-looking or below in the competitive world of online dating. I have no doubt it is no better for women who are in the same league for looks. The only difference is that those women usually sit passively on the sidelines, being passed up by most men in favor of messaging the better-looking women, and they end up getting only a handful of messages per month on the dating site. Same result as the men, they end up meeting very few people in person from the dating site.

And I know full well, before anyone reminds me of it, that those seemingly shallow women who pass me up in their first round of messaging and meeting some of the men from the site are obviously not my type if they passed me up so casually, but it still doesn't take away from the fact that nobody who loves themselves and has some self esteem and self respect, doesn't feel some sadness or regret at being rejected by so many solely on the basis of looks, without even having their initial message read.

Does he mean that he's from "Rent a Crowd - cardboard people"?