Like most women my age, I have al­ways har­boured fan­tasies about a uni­formed man com­ing into my place of work, lit­er­ally sweep­ing me off my feet and car­ry­ing me off into the sunset. In An Officer and a Gentleman, Richard Gere dons a white naval uni­form and does ex­actly that to Debra Winger. We all re­mem­ber it — it’s stored in our men­tal fil­ing cab­i­net, next to John Cusack hold­ing up the boom-box in Say Anything.

But truth is way more bor­ing than fic­tion, and the stereo­type of the dash­ing man in uni­form is just that — a stereotype. Case in point: be­low is an email I re­ceived yes­ter­day on an on­line dat­ing site. It pretty much speaks for itself. 

my name is Joe McCreepy*. I was born and brought up in Atlanta,Georgia,United state and now work with the united states army de­part­ment as a cap­tain.
am 38 years old.…i came across your pro­file on here and i felt you could be the one am look­ing for, so I have de­cided to write you this long mes­sage giv­ing you the full de­tails of me..
I like meet­ing new peo­ple and learn­ing new things​.Am a real guy who ap­pre­ci­ates a gentlewoman.i don’t play games and i don’t want any woman to play me be­cause i have had so many bad ex­pe­ri­ence in my re­la­tion­ship in the past.. i have been hurt so many times and i know what it feels to be hurt.. am Intelligent,very educated,full of passions,attractive and very hon­est with any­thing i do in life …
I want to ask you– what if some­one you never know ‚some­one you never meet ‚some­one you never talked to…was the only some­one for you..think about it 
Am look­ing for a very good se­ri­ous re­la­tion­ship with a loving,caring,romantic,faithful and a hon­est woman.someone who’s go­ing to love me and that i will love in returns…do you have IM so we could talk on messenger?…my ya­hoo id is xxx ex­pect­ing to hear from you soon.

Kind Regards.
cpt.joe mccreepy

*Names have been changed to pro­tect the weird and stalker-ish.

Now, I’ve al­ways been the type to re­spond, even with a sim­ple “No, thank you.” Which is what I did. This is what I got back:

hi,
Thanks for your message.i live in Atlanta but am cur­rently de­ployed to Israel by the united states army de­part­ment… I want to ask you– what if some­one you never know ‚some­one you never meet ‚some­one you never talked to…was the only some­one for you..think about it..long dis­tance doesn’t matter,we will get to meet some day.if you get to click together,i could re­lo­cate to Canada.…we could get to talk more on IM,my ya­hoo id is xxx .what is your email?,so i could add you on my IM list.expecting to hear from you.
joe

At ease, soilder. At ease.

As if.