Linda Jensen — Craig’s List Dating: Like Panning for Gold

Linda uses a 21^st Century dating service to find her man in one of the world’s most historic cities.

“I’m thinking or writing a series of articles about putting personal ads on Craig’s List. Have any of you ever done that?”

“Craig’s List! Nothing but a bunch of phonies!”

“”They just play games with you”

“You only hear from a bunch of weirdo’s”

“You mean Craig’s Lust?” We all laughed.

That was quite a reaction. I was sitting with a group of friends before the start of a transgender support group meeting. As I said I had been thinking of writing the articles. What I didn’t say was that the articles were going to be mostly about my experiences with Craig’s List, so called the good, the bad and the ugly.

“I’m surprised. When did you all put ads on Craig’s List?” I asked in response to the general criticism. I knew what their answers would be as none of them seemed to be the dating type.

“We would never do that,” was the universal reply. I resisted the temptation to ask how they can have such strong opinions on something they have not tried.

“I’ve looked at the ads,” added one of the girls named Gina’s, “they seem so creepy.” The girls nodded their heads in agreement. “Usually the photos don’t include their faces and what’s with their fascination with genitalia?” added another.

“Well, the ads are for casual encounters,” I replied, “and everyone knows those are sex ads. They are not looking for life companions. But I agree they could do better.” I was worried that I was going to appear too defensive. “I’ve used Craig’s List a lot in the last two years. I agree the ads could be better but they are nothing compared to some of the replies you receive.”

“Hey, wait a minute. You’ve placed ads on Craig’s List? Are you nuts? Why would you do that?” asked Barbara. I found myself with the attention of the whole group.

“I travel a lot. Most of the time when I want to be Linda it means leaving home.” I started to explain, “Frankly, I enjoy the pleasure of male attention when I am being Linda. To enjoy it you have to find it. That used to mean going to cities with the great drag clubs such as the Queen Mary in Los Angeles, Backstreet in Atlanta and Ziegfeld’s in DC. I used to be able to depend on finding a nice man to date for the evening and sometimes longer at any of those clubs.”

“Didn’t you tell me about a couple of guys you met at the Queen Mary?” asked the tall Gina.

“Yes, but those clubs are all gone now. It is harder and harder to go in to a city and find the action.”

“New clubs have appeared to take the place of those that closed,” countered Gina.

“They’re not the same. Besides maybe I should say that it is getting easier and easier to find the same type of companionship in the Internet, particularly on Craig’s List. I’ve met some pretty neat guys through Craig’s List?”

“What about the ‘games players’?” asked the shorter Gina.

“You have to separate out a lot of waste to get to the gems but it is worth the search. It is like panning for gold.” That was an overstatement but it was the best analogy I could recall at the moment. “After the meeting I’ll tell you about my experience in London last summer.”

The group meeting started, droned on for about an hour and ended. We then had coffee and refreshments. I was joined by the same group of girls and a few others.

“So Linda, tell us about London.”

“Yes, enquiring minds want to know.”

“Last July I had a chance to attend a conference in Stockholm. I arranged my travel so I could have stopovers in London both going and coming back. A little Internet search showed me there were no shortage of t-friendly clubs in London and no shortage of admirers at those clubs. There was a good chance of meeting someone at one of those clubs however I decided to try my luck with Craig’s List.

“I placed an ad in the Casual Encounters Section for Craig’s List in London. It indicated that this 47 year old Canadian would be visiting London in the near future, staying in the Limebank area and looking for gentleman companionship. I included a couple of photos that I thought were alluring”

“Did you get any resposnes?”

“I got tons of responses. Many were of the texted ‘cum suk me. I’d lik 2 suk u 2′ variety. They got a quick delete but there were a lot of very nice detailed responses, genuine in their approach and sharing a lot of detail about themselves. One admired my ad but would not be available because he was tied up with the Henley Regatta. A few continued to exchange messages with me but one emerged as my date of choice.”

“You actually met someone?” asked the skeptical ‘tall Gina.’

“Yes, his name was David. He didn’t live in London but he said he was willing to travel the hour in to London to meet me. He wrote all the right things, that he loved my look in the photos, my dresses and that I was ‘convincing’. He also told me a bit about himself, that he was bi and that he had experience dating t-girls. That last bit is important as often the t-curious will just drop out at the last minute.

“As we exchanged more messages I learned more about David, his business and his love of traveling around Europe to attend concerts by rock groups of the ‘80s. Bruce Springsteen and Neil Young in London, U2 in Barcelona: he mentioned them as if he had been to the local club for karaoke night. That was very intriguing but what sold me on him was his plan to take me out for dinner and an evening on the town before we settled in to the hotel room for the night.

“I arrived in London on a Friday morning. Our date was set for the Saturday, my second day in London. I was mostly over my jet lag. David planned to pick me up about 6 PM, take me to dinner and then to the Way Out Club, the popular Saturday evening venue for tg’s and their admirers.

“I dressed modestly for dinner, a black and white dress, low cut and knee length and, as David was shorter than I, low shoes. I was apprehensive that he wouldn’t show up. About 1/3 of my Craig’s List arranged dates back out at the last minute. However, good to his word David arrived on time.”

“I guess that was a relief,” chipped in Amanda.

“Well my Plan B would have been a bit of sleep before I headed to the Way Out Club but I was getting hungry. We found a London cab right outside my hotel door. It was just arriving with a load of Japanese tourists. Immediately our ‘cabbie’, an east ender started criticizing the group for choosing to stay at a hotel away from the center of London. ‘They may save a few quid on the room but they will be paying more to get anywhere.’

“David recognized the accent and the two became instant friends, comparing how they had grown up in adjacent neighbourhoods, sharing stories of events past and talking about our restaurant destination. I thought I was just quietly fitting in but nothing got by our cabbie.”

“What do you mean?”

“They had been talking about nightlife in the Soho district when out of the blue, our cabbie suggested I might be more comfortable at the Vauxhall Tavern?”

“What’s that?”

“Vauxhall is a district in South London The tavern was for years a club famous for its female impersonation shows. It was not a gay club but straight crowds and tg’s alike visited the Vauxhall when they wanted to see a drag show. But to the best of my knowledge it was no longer part of the scene.”

“So why did he mention it?”

“I don’t know,” I replied, “but in the one statement he let me know that I’d been read and that at least he thought I wouldn’t feel comfortable in this posh and popular restaurant that was our destination. It was a bit unnerving. As I had moved through the crowd in the hotel lobby and among the Japanese tourists I’d been pretty confident that I was passing without notice as to my true gender. It only took a London cabbie looking in a rear-view mirror to say a few well-meaning words to totally burst that illusion.”

“Did you want to turn around and go back to the hotel?”

“Hell, no. It didn’t faze me. It was just a dose of reality. You know my motto: ‘just like the trees and the birds in the sky we have a right to be there.’ Besides I had David to protect me.

“The restaurant he had chosen was called the Bistrotheque,” I continued, “it was in a converted warehouse, hidden on a back street in the east end of London. It had no street presence at all. You could pass by it without knowing it was there. However both David and the cabbie knew exactly where it was. That evening so did several hundred other Londoners as there were easily those many in the large upstairs dining room as we arrived to be seated. Tables were close together so conversation was not going to be exactly private. That didn’t matter as David and I settled in to talking easily about his love of music, his work, his family. I learned he was a widower with two grown daughters who often attended concerts with him. Amazingly I found myself easily sharing details of my family, my relationships and how I seemed to find partners who accepted that there is a part of me called Linda and even that there is a bisexual side to me.

“The food and the wine at the Bistrotheque were excellent. I was really enjoying myself and I’m pretty sure David felt very comfortable with me. However as the dinner wore on I found my energy level draining. Jet lag was taking over in a big way. I said to David, ‘we can go to the Way Out Club as planned or we can go right back to the hotel. I’m not going to have the energy to do both.’

“Happily he elected that we should return to the hotel. As the meal concluded David paid the bill. We exited the restaurant to a waiting cab. The return cab ride was much less eventful. We chatted quietly to each other. Our minds were on the rest of the evening. “

“We’re you concerned about inviting a stranger to your hotel room?”

“Not a bit. David was no longer a stranger and I’m sure that was no ‘pistol in his pocket.’”

The girls laughed at the Mae West reference. Around us it never got old.

“The room and the bed were small by North American standards but other than the constant sound of diesel traffic outside everything was very comfortable. I didn’t have any refreshments to offer so we’ got right to it’. I excused myself to the bathroom; I felt a strong need to wash and rinse my private area. Then it was David’s turn. That was really considerate. The rest of the evening went as I hoped. We made love then we chatted before he left for his drive home.

“I rarely would like to have a man stay over the night but if I did David would have been one. I could have seen myself waking up early to re-do my make-up then putting on some coffee to have him wake up to the aroma of fresh brewed coffee. After his morning bathroom call I would have liked to settle in to playing with him while he enjoyed his coffee. But alas he was gone,” I said with a feigned sigh.

“Did you see him again?’

“Sadly, I didn’t. I tried to set up a date when I returned through London two weeks later but David was busy with one of his daughters. We exchanged some e-mails. He is still going to concerts and apparently our evening had awakened an interest of his in gay sex. He told me of an affair he was having with a young man.

“So life goes on. I’m not sure if the next time in London I would even see him again.”

“That would be too bad,” reflected tall Gina.

“Yes,” I agreed, “however there’s always Craig’s List.”

“After all the trouble you went to find one person you’d still use Craig’s List?” Amanda asked.

“Call it finding a needle in a haystack, a diamond in the rough, panning for gold or whatever you like it is still worth the search,” I replied. “Next time I will tell you how I’ve refined my search techniques to improve my chances of finding that nugget of gold.”

Category: Transgender Fun & Entertainment