Richard and Kristie In 2010, after sixteen years of marriage, Richard found himself single. He hadn’t dated since college, and the dating world had changed a great deal since. He decided to take a sabbatical from dating for an entire year. He wanted to figure out his next step. He wanted to experience that peace of being alone but not lonely. “I had lots of friends say, Hey, my sister’s dog walker’s niece is available,” he says. “Everybody wanted to fix me up.” Post-sabbatica

Tom and Eric The year was 2002. Eric had just turned forty and hadn’t been in a serious relationship in eight years. When he first moved to California in the eighties, he dated the old-fashioned way; he tried running personal ads in the paper a few times to meet people. “It’s frightening to think about doing that now, but that’s what we did.” Over the next twenty years, he had one long-term relationship and a couple of shorter ones. He became increasingly frustrated, not find