Struggles of a Single Girl

No, Peter. Showering with your mom is ALWAYS a deal breaker.

Dear Single Men of the NY Metro Area People of the Universe: 

It’s time to sit up and put on your big boy pants. As a collective whole, we agree that dating, and first dates in particular suck. We also agree that they are a necessary evil if we’re to ever get out of the online dating sewer maze. And, while I cannot guarantee that every first date will feel like slipping on fuzzy slippers after digging out your car in a blizzard, I’d like to think I might be able to make this process be just a little less painful. 

Here’s some general life and dating advice from someone who has suffered, endured, and persevered through countless first dates*:  

1. Use basic table manners. Do not serve yourself with your fingers, unless your first date is at Medieval Times, or a taco truck. Don’t talk with your mouth open, use a napkin, don’t pick at your teeth with your straw, don’t be rude to waitstaff, say please and thank you. We’re evolved from apes, we sit at tables and use silverware, I trust you can navigate this without Emily Post. 

2. Do not repeatedly check your phone and tell me who’s texting you, or worse, respond. Can you just leave it in your pocket unless you’re actually a Marvel Superhero and you’re being summoned to rescue a baby from a Super Villain.

3.  Do not use our first date to tell me stories about other girls. I don’t care about the time you dated a girl after she dated your friend. I don’t want to know that you’re okay with sloppy seconds. I also don’t want to know about the time you tried to date multiple girls from the same family. Actually, I don’t want to know about the other people you’ve dated unless we’re serious. Mmmkay?

4. Don’t tell me that 85% or more of your outfit came from Target. I just spent two hours getting ready to find the right balance between effort and effortless and you’re most proud of your $4 sneakers.  

5. Have a couple conversation topics ready to go (that have nothing to do with sex or your previous exploits) that will help avoid a painful drag in conversation. If we’ve been texting, you should have a plethora of options. “How’s your drink?” When my drink is a bottle of water or a glass of seltzer is not viable here.

6. Read the room. Is your date keeping up with you drink for drink, or did they stop after 1 round. No one wants to be sitting across from someone who is 6 drinks deep when they’re either done drinking or not drinking at all. It makes you look silly. If you want to keep drinking, ask, or do it on your own time.  

7. Do not ask me to hold your flask whilst you pee in the street before making me step over said puddle so you can give me a ride back to my car. Just hold it. BE. BETTER. 

Yes, dating can be awkward, you’re trying to generate something out of nothing, but even if it’s not going to work out, the experience can at least be pleasant. People meet and interact all the time without falling in love, but it’s better if I’m not regretting that I ever got out of leggings to meet you in the first place. 

*I have indeed lived to tell the tale of every one of these ridiculous experiences and then some. Just don’t effing do it. Okay? Pretty please? Pinky promise?

We’ve been told we only get one shot to make a first impression. That may be true, especially in the online dating world, but, once you start talking to someone, how much of a chance should this person actually get?

Here’s why I’m asking...

Last week I started chatting with a new prospect. He was easy to talk to and the messages were flowing back and forth with ease. Previously in the conversation I’d mentioned having a family commitment later that day but didn’t share any of the specifics. Hi, we just started talking and you barely know more than my first name- you don’t need to know every intimate detail, and if you think you do, you’re wrong. But I digress. 

Anyway, my evening with family consisted of a two-hour drive to New Jersey, dinner, an overnight and spending time with extended family wherein I try like hell not to be attached to my phone. First of all, it’s rude. And, second of all, I so rarely spend time with family that I don’t want to spend the entire time with my face in my phone. 

Okay so, talking with NP (New Prospect), and had to get on the road. Since we hadn’t even gone so far as to exchange numbers, I just let the conversation wane. 

Upon pulling in the driveway, I checked my messages one last time before heading into dinner, and apologized for being unresponsive while driving. The next day we resumed chatting although my lag time between messages was considerably longer than the day before. Again, didn’t want to be rude and attached to my phone. Forgive me for trying to be present and respectful. 

I find myself in a moment where my six-month old cousin has just been put down for a nap, the rest of my family is out running an errand and the only other person in the house has fallen asleep. I reach for my phone and find the following, “I don’t think this is going to work out. Good luck.” 

No reason, no context. I’m puzzled. 

I respond, “I’m really sorry to hear that. If it’s because I haven’t been chatty today, I’m still with family and don’t want to be rude.” 

He writes back. Did I get a reprieve? Is he perhaps understanding of the situation? Nope. He says, “No, not really. Just got bored.” 

I am a deeply flawed individual. I’m a chronic over thinker. I can be bossy and neurotic. I can be chatty and too loud. Boring is not one of them. Though, I suppose that could be relative. 

In any case, I feel like someone just threw cold water on me and like I wasn’t given a fair shot. Maybe I didn’t any enough questions in response, maybe I didn’t use enough LOLs, who knows. Sure, I’ve been on dates where I was bored and started counting the number of times the person rambling next to me pursed his lips, or lost his train of thought in an overly drawn out “um.” When it came time to decide whether or not to see each other again, I’d opted out of a second date, but I never in a million years would have told these men that was the reason. It’s just mean, and it makes you look like an insensitive ass. Just sayin’. 

Was an insincere “good luck” better than ghosting? Maybe. Possibly, albeit only barely. 

How long should a first impression be? Was 36 hours long enough? Too short? I know that with swiping apps and speed dating, we’ve created a culture of being quick to say, “next” because something better, funnier, prettier, neater, taller, wealthier is out there. But I wonder if we’re really giving people a fair shot. 

Single girl......confused. 

I get it, we live in a world where ghosting is all too real. But, can we agree that if we’ve seen each other naked that ghosting is just rude? No? Just me? Got it. 

Here’s the full story. BHG (Big Haired Ghost) we call him this because his hair rivaled Michael J. Fox in Back to the Future and hadn’t been updated since his first haircut in 1990. Anyway, BHG and I started talking a week or two before our first date. He suggested a bar not too far from Grand Central since we were both headed home from that direction. 

The first date was easy and quippy and BHG had asked me out again before we’d even gotten to the trains. Were things finally looking up for me? Had I gotten over my first date slump?

We went out again on Friday and had a lovely dinner, followed by heading back to my apartment to watch a movie. Needless to say, it became more Netfix & Chill than Netflix pretty quickly. 

He left with the promise that he’d call me, because I guess that’s what you say after you hookup with someone, regardless of whether or not you mean it. 

Immediately after, texts were met with minimal responses, and there was one late-night “wanna hang out?” text. Oddly enough, responding with “I don’t do booty calls” was the death knell. Later the next week, my suggestion for lunch and/or apple picking entered the ether of where ghosted texts go to die 

No response, not even so much as an “I liked spending time with you, but I don’t think this is going to work out,” text. So it leaves me wondering when basic respect went out of style. 

Singlegirl ghosted. Again.

Have you ever listened to your parents talk about how they met? In 2017, it sounds like the stuff of movies and fairy tales. My parents, for example, met my dad’s freshman year of college in the cafeteria when he chose to sit with another girl he knew from his hometown. Forty years, two kids and two dogs later, they’re still together.  Now, here I am swiping through a plethora of dating apps and wondering what the hell went wrong. The thing is, I know exactly what happened. Our online-centered, window-shopping, “give it to me now” mentality changed the game and gave everyone “shiny ball syndrome.” In turn, we’ve created a culture of always believing we can do better. We swipe left or right based solely on physical attraction, and giving people barely a three-second glance before deciding he’s not worthy because he has on a (hopefully) ironic Homer Simpson t-shirt, or opted for a gym selfie as his profile picture. 

Beyond the mere struggle of wading through the muck of online options, we’re forced to reconcile the fact that as we get older and our college days have long since passed, that it’s bordering on impossible to meet anyone organically. Now in our thirties, many of our friends have paired off and are starting families, meanwhile the popular spots like coffee shops, trains, and bars are desolate wastelands of people with their headphones in, and their faces buried deep within their phones. 

I’m willing to admit that I, too, am guilty of these things. I’ve disregarded men simply because he didn’t smile in a single photo, or that his profile was littered with typos. We no longer leave room for a first impression or building a foundation, and all of this judgement comes before there’s even a chance for a first date. 

Fast forward to those rare occasions when a few days of witty repartee manifests itself into an actual face-to-face meeting over drinks or coffee- we try to generate a spark out of thin air. It’s drastically different from dating in high school, or college where chances were that you had a class in common, had over lapping friends or some parts of your lives were tangentially related at a minimum. Now, you bide your time before meeting the friends and to even suggest doing so too quickly could scare him off. 

Gone are the days of the “three day rule” and the dating game of yore. Now we self-edit our texts for fear of being “too eager” too soon. We change “and” to “or” because “dinner and a movie” is possibly too much commitment for a third date. We have unspoken rules of knowing that if we sent the last text at night, it’s on him to send the first text in the morning. We’ve been conditioned to believe that to show interest is already too much of a commitment.  

Instead, we read between the lines of oddly placed emoijis, brace ourselves for unsolicited d*ck pics, and steel ourselves for the next time we get ghosted without warning or so much as an afterthought. 

Online dating was supposed to make it easier to find eligible singles in your area, instead it eroded the respect people have for attempting to build genuine connections based on more than a swipe, and made it okay for a guy to ask me my bra size long before he’s ever even met me in person. 

I love technology. I stay connected to my friends through social media and gif-laden text messages, but I’d give anything to go back to an offline, real-world, “hey, is this seat taken,” kind of dating. 

This morning, as I scrolled idly on my phone during commute, I came across the above post from The Strand Bookstore. As an avid reader, this got me thinking about how books inform our own reality. Spoiler alert: this post is about to venture into the uber nerdy. 

Do we as readers choose books that have parallel themes to our own lives? Or, do we simply seek out books with a compelling story to tell? Curiosity piqued...

And here’s why, last week was a bit bumpy in terms of my dating life. Things fell through with a guy I’d been talking to, and looking forward to meeting. (Dear men, if we haven’t started dating and you get back with your ex....it’s cool, just fucking own it, and don’t string anyone else along.) But I digress. Anyway, growing up, whenever the world feels like a bit more than I can handle, I’ve always turned to books as the perfect way to escape to an alternate reality where my ish can be put on mute. 

This can get a bit complicated, when normally that escape route looks a lot like stories of whirlwind romances or people getting their happily ever after (even if it’s not getting the guy). 

Back to last week, where I stood in the bookshop at Grand Central, poring over paperbacks trying to find a story that called to me, without two of the characters ending up between the sheets or skipping hand-in-hand into rainbows and piles of puppies. Is that really too much to ask? Crossing my fingers, I made a selection and ventured towards the train and my journey home. 

Now, despite my discerning eye and best efforts, sure enough, the main character ends up with her life wrapped in a perfect little bow. Dream job. Dream apartment. Dream guy. Rainbows. Puppies. Kissed by a damn angel. 

So, now I’m wondering, what does a girl read when she wants a great story that’s free of romance and guaranteed happy endings, but also not the kind of thing that’s going to be full of gore, or stressful twists and turns? Do we need disclaimers? WARNING: DO NOT READ IF FEELING BITTER.

Where are the stories of people like me simply trying to put one foot in front of the other? Those of us simply surviving? I suppose, if I’m my own protagonist, you could make the case that the job, and the move to NY, and the trivial things are my rising action. Each guy who ghosted, quit one date in, or sent an unsolicited dick-pic is just a consequential plot point. But the reality is, fiction is easier. When you’re a woman who deep-down wants the stuff of story books: conversations over candlelight, holding hands in Paris, and pancakes on Sunday morning, it’s hard to be patient waiting for puppies and rainbows in the world of “you up?” text messages at 2 AM. 

So. Here’s the thing. Dating sucks. 

When you’re no longer 18, dating for free meals, and the walk of shame is slightly less than acceptable, you’re forced to come to terms with a few things: 

1. You’re 30. 

2. You’re 30 and single. 

3. The dating pool is overrun with Fuckboys and man-children who have no idea what they want. (You caught me on a bitter day, sorry. But only a little.)

4. Your lady-tribe is being depleted rapidly as one-by-one (two-by-two?) they step into new roles as wives and mothers. #LuckyBitches

These things have brought me here. To a place where I intend to share all of the ups and downs of my love life navigating the dating world, and the rest of the world, as a 30-something single woman in Metro NY. 

In the spirit of my approach to dating, and to protect the stupid, the crazy, and the straight-up mundane, I won’t be sharing names here. Hopefully, we’ll avoid having to share mugshots. But, who can say. I’ve given out the suicide hotline number. All things are possible. 

Anyway, here goes nothing. Hopefully this will all work out in the end. 

SingleGirl out.