A Tale of Tinder

So there I was swiping,

0 – 60 in 21 seconds
That’s approximately 3 swipes a second, 180 swipes per minute
With the occasional wrong right mixed within it

As my fingers skipped
over the conveyor belt catalogue of hope and possibility
There you were

My digit stroked your face and
twitched back and forth in a little shudder of indecision
and if I’m to be honest
you looked truly beautiful
and something in my heart started to melt
feelings forgotten hinted to be felt

But in an flicker of an instant,
and a hundred micro calculations later
I decided that
I didn’t like that hat you were wearing
So I swiped left

In that moment, the infinite unraveling potential of our future disappeared.

All quantum possibilities collapsed into an irreversible decision,

And it was over, in this universe, for all eternity

A few more swipes, being a superficial spectator
I matched with Ashleigh, a roller skater, just 18
who told me some delightfully obscene things
that she would like to do to me
but then unmatched me two minutes later

If I had swiped right
I would have learnt that
you hated that hat
That your mum had given to you for your birthday and that
you were just wearing it to be polite
And that at the moment uploading your pics
It was the only upright photo you had
and that you thought it was better to have it there than not

as not showing your body might suggest there’s something seriously wrong with it!

If I had swiped right I would have discovered

that you were the one person in all the 18 – 48 years olds in 20 mile radius

that understood my madness enough to love it

And that we would have made it!

You would have found me endearing rather than enraging
and our conversations would have been deep, profound and engaging

And our spark would have exploded alight into something fully blazing
into a love that would have grown and grown into something truly amazing

And we would have supported each other through our fears and into our wildest dreams,
exploring near and far lands and the parts of us unseen

as our stories would have intertwined from two lost souls into something beautiful, sacred and divine.

Maybe in another universe
the one where I did swipe right
I’m loving that hat almost as much as I love you
because it reminds me of everything we have
and of that moment I made the right decision

I suppose in actuality it probably wasn’t even the damn hat
that caused it all to be left behind

But that it was more about you, your sincereness and your realness that shone through and the reality that my subconscious knew that you and I might actually be a possibility