Disappearing Act

Patrick and I called it quits after six weeks. We had started strong: a fun conversation at a friend's party in February, a quick kiss goodnight, an exchange of e-mail addresses, phone numbers, and business cards. Three days later, we embarked on a tumultuous relationship full of highs and lows, hopes and near-misses - everything except ever seeing each other again in person.

He was busy. I was busy. His parents came to town. I vacationed in Spain. He broke a date for business travel, I broke one because of the flu. As winter dissolved into spring, our e-mail response time dwindled from same day to more than a week. I began to wonder if I'd recognize Patrick again across an empty room, much less a crowded one. I remembered his being tall and lanky, and I knew his hair was brown - unless it was dark blond. In early April, Patrick sent an e-mail lamenting our mismatched schedules, I promised to call when "life got less crazy," and that was it. The romantic momentum, that ineffable spark I felt the night we had met, had died out like an abandoned campfire.

Supposedly, Americans are busier than ever these days; certainly, we tell one another we are, no doubt because we all need to feel important, to believe that without our PowerPoint presentations and lovingly prepared macaroni dishes, our companies and families would collapse. But singles may have a particular need to be busy.

The first time I used Match.com, I was struck by the jampacked schedules professed by online daters. Judging by the profiles, we are all single-handedly building biotech companies, hiking Everest, and curing bird flu; naturally, we all want partners with similarly full lives. It seems our greatest collective fear isn't that we'll meet ax murderers or bigamists in cyberspace. It's that we'll meet, and be taken for, exactly what we are: people who use the Internet to find dates.

But this desire to seem busy, and to be busy, can have unintended consequences. In Patrick's and my case, it meant we never saw each other again. I like to think that if I had been really interested, I would have postponed dinner with my mother or skipped that first-time-homebuyer's seminar. And, yes, part of me knew that if Patrick had been really interested, he would have found a way to see me again. Perhaps our mistake was in waiting for the other person to show a strong interest first, to say, "Yes, yes, I'm dying to see you, and here's how I'll prove it."

After all, for anyone who has been disappointed on a blind date, a busy schedule is a socially acceptable way to avoid future disappointment. It's a way of saying no to risk without actually saying no, of telling ourselves we'll make time when the right person comes along (in a shower of fireworks), but not until then. We might find the time to send an e-mail or two, and many of us manage to spend hours online - low-risk solo activities - but when it comes to committing to an after-work drink, did we mention we have, like, a totally insane week coming up?

I once received the following message from a man online: "Give me a reason to write you a longer note than this." No doubt, he'd penned odes to other women's profiles, not gotten the desired responses, and didn't want to "waste" his time anymore. I felt for him. But his defensive stance proved self-fulfilling: I didn't reply.

But then I heard from Steve via the same website. I liked his profile and replied; he quickly sent his phone number and we chatted, deciding to make a date. As it turned out, I was busy Monday and Tuesday, he had plans Wednesday, and Thursday was a national holiday. Hazy visions of Patrick - indeterminate hair color and all - danced before my eyes. Then Steve cleared his throat. "Know what? If Wednesday's the only day you're free next week, I'm going to cancel dinner with my friend. He won't care."

"Are you sure?" I asked, half-pleased, half- worried that he had nothing better to do. Was he one of those people without a life? You know, the sort who use the Internet?

"Yup. I'd like to meet you, and I'm afraid if we wait two weeks, the momentum will die."

This could be love, I thought. Now all I have to do is meet him in person.

Alison Lobron lives in Concord. E-mail comments to coupling@globe.com.