My Quest Began On Quest.

*This memory is a continuation of the 'Bumblebees In My Bathroom' memory.

Within a couple months after moving into my condo, I was getting pretty used to living on my own. I wasn’t even remotely as miserable as I thought I was going to be and I could feel my old self slowly returning. I was surprised at just how quickly I was adapting to my new environment and lifestyle. I had freedom for the first time in my adult life and everything I did was now on my schedule.

I was coming and going as I pleased.

I was still on my winter route schedule and working a four day week. I had every Wednesday off so I would always pick Stephanie up for lunch at her school. We always went to Wendy’s every week mostly because she loved having the chocolate Frosty. I looked so forward to our Wednesday lunches; it was really nice to have some extra time together. As far as I could tell Stephanie too seemed to be adapting very well to having parents who were divorced.

I was told kids are always more resilient than their parents give them credit for and Stephanie was proving it.

Even though I had moved out of the house and was living on my own, I still held out hope Bonnie would change her mind. One morning she would wake up and come to her senses. She would realize the enormous mistake she had made and how selfish she had been for tearing our family apart. Although deep down I knew it would never happen, I am pretty sure that I would have went back to her. In my heart I still loved her and I would have done anything to save my marriage and keep our family together.

Well, that is until I realized Bonnie had been cheating on me all along and then everything changed.

For weeks after Bonnie told me she wanted a divorce, I asked her repeatedly if there was someone else. She swore to me there was never anyone else and that she had never cheated on me. She kept saying that we were married for eighteen years and couples grow apart. She just wasn’t happy anymore and she now wanted and needed her own space.

I believed her.

She adamantly told me over and over how she had no time for anyone else in her life; she was too busy in her new job. It could not have been any more convenient for her as Bonnie was cheating on me while she was travelling for her job. As it turns out my wife was spreading her legs for another man on her business trips while I was at home looking after our daughter. It is now all too crystal clear as to why Bonnie was always gone for a week to attend just a two or three day mid-week trade show. And to think I actually fell for the cheaper flights with a weekend layover bullshit that she kept telling me.

I still can’t believe I was that gullible and I was that stupid.

I should have listened to all those people who kept telling me all along Bonnie was indeed seeing someone else. So many friends told me that Bonnie had to be cheating on me and they all said the exact same thing. No woman throws away what Bonnie had in her life unless there is someone else waiting in the wings. I knew I had no control over who Bonnie wanted to date or who she might someday marry. Just like she had no say whatsoever as to whom I wanted to be with. Eventually, both of us would move on to other relationships, it was just a matter of time.

We were now both free agents.

However, there was absolutely no way that I would ever be okay with my daughter having a black man as her stepfather. If Bonnie and I never had a child together I could give a rat's ass who she dated or married. Black, brown, yellow or white would never have been an issue with me. She could have been a lesbian for all I cared.

I let Bonnie know how I felt in no uncertain terms.

Bonnie told me that she didn’t see colour and she would be raising our daughter the same way. She told me that I needed to get with the times and that I needed to stop living in the Stone Age. She also told me I needed to get on with my life and mind my own business.

Blah Blah Blah.

You can call me a Stone Age Neanderthal all you want. I will never be okay with my daughter living in the same house with a black man as her stepfather.

Period.

Once I left the house I began to write a daily journal. Just like I write my memories in this blog, I wrote my daily experiences about living on my own. I became obsessed with putting all my thoughts down on paper. I was brutally honest and forthright in expressing my true feelings towards Bonnie, family and friends. I wrote about everything that was going on in my life.

It was always amusing to me how friends always seem obligated to pick a side when couples go through a divorce. It’s like they can no longer be friends with both of us anymore. To many of our mutual friends Bonnie had become nothing but a laughing stock as she paraded her new black boyfriend around seeking their immediate approval. So many friends and even Bonnie's own family were all now snickering at her behind her back.

Every Sunday night I would print off what I had written that week on my computer. I would then add the pages to the ‘Life On My Own’ folder in my filing cabinet. Within a couple months the folder had gotten quite large as it was now well over two hundred pages in length.

With my one time love of my life now out of my life, my quest would now be to find another love of my life. Wow, I just wrote the word my five times in a single sentence. I was really starting to miss having intimacy in my life and I wanted it back. Although I by no means wanted another full-time relationship, at least not right away. I was very curious and excited to venture into what was quickly becoming the easiest and safest way to meet people of the opposite sex, internet dating.

The Toronto Sun ran daily ads for many online dating sites. On most of the sites you had the choice of either telephone or internet dating. In 2001 the internet was still in its very early stages of existence. I was already surfing the web in my condo using my dial up Netscape. I was forty years old and very computer illiterate. Finally, I took the plunge and decided to post my first dating profile on the Quest Personals website. It took me a while, but I finally got my profile finished and posted. My handle was 'ISCREAMAN' only because 'ICECREAMMAN' was already taken.

I quickly discovered there were literally dozens of single attractive women living within a twenty mile radius from where I was living. I also found myself only clicking on profiles of women who had a pretty profile picture. I figured for me to get the same exposure I would also need a profile pic, but I had absolutely no idea how to post one. I decided to mail my photo to Quest and have them post it for me within a two week waiting period.

Meanwhile, I felt like a kid in a candy store.

Once my photo was posted, I was always editing my profile. I was always trying to make myself as attractive, appealing and desirable to any potential female suitors.

It wasn’t that easy.

After one such edit, I got a few very sexy messages within a couple days. They were messages from much younger girls who were all half my age. Each of them told me how they would enjoy meeting me and how they would like to spend some time with me. Each message included numerous naked pictures leaving nothing to my imagination. All of them were beautiful and each of them looked like a porn star. Although I didn’t message any of them back, it was indeed very tempting.

I knew it would be costing me much more than just spending some time with them should they ever show up at my condo.

I re-examined my last edit.

I had written 'I was forty years old, self-employed and living in a condo in Mississauga'. I changed it to 'I was forty years old and living in Mississauga'. I never got another nude photo of a beautiful girl proudly displaying her assets again.

Damn!

Over the course of almost three months, I actually met in person eight women I had chatted with on Quest. For the most part, it was a simple coffee and a face to face chat. One woman was an avid golfer and we met at the driving range and chatted over a bucket of balls. A couple of the women after chatting online we decided to meet for lunch at the Movenpick Restaurant in Yorkville. I enjoyed meeting each and every one of them, but with exception of the two women I met for lunch there was no real sexual attraction.

I am sure the feeling was mutual and there were no second dates.

Although having casual no strings attached sex with different women was something I wanted to experience, it just was not in my DNA. I simply wasn’t wired to have sex and then wake up the next morning with a strange woman who I had met online.

I knew then that I would never be that 'one night stand' type of guy.

Damn! again.

Still every night I would scroll through pages and pages of potential dates. I quickly discovered most of the women my age had like me already been married. Most of the MILF’s that I clicked on had young children and were quite eager to settle down and play happy families. I knew soon after chatting that many were simply looking for a father figure in their kid’s lives and I was not willing to go down that road. I had absolutely no interest in being a daddy to another man’s children no matter how great his ex-wife was in the sack.

I was becoming discouraged; maybe this internet dating was not for me.

But, before I gave up completely I stumbled across a profile of an attractive woman who also lived in Mississauga. She was a yummy mummy and a sassy lassy with a passionate spirit. I was so intrigued after viewing her profile, I sent her a message. I told her I would be interested in meeting for a coffee and if she liked what she saw after reading my profile to call me.

I told her my name was Mike and I left her my phone number.

I remember thinking it would sure be nice to meet at least one woman who after our first date we would mutually agree to go on a second date together.

I was tired; I shut my computer off and went to bed alone.

Again.