The Rules Have Changed...and Left Us All Confused

Friday morning, I woke up after only pressing the snooze button twice, got ready, and rushed out the door to make it to work just in the nick of time. I got in the car, turned it on, backed out of the garage, and by the time the car was free of its home, I had changed the radio station from - YUCK - talk radio to the first FM station I could find. The Party.

Mornings on this station usually contain a lot of commercials and talk about celebrity scandals, hookups and breakups. However, this morning, unlike so many others, the conversation between the DJs grabbed me by the ears.

I didn't know it until later when my mom forwarded me the link to the New York Times article "The End of Courtship" that they had not come up with this topic of discussion all on their own.

All the same, I was hooked; even more so considering the fact that I had just gone on only the 7th real live date of my life. (I'm 23, so that gives me about 7 years of real dating time. That means I could have averaged one date per year since I was 16 and old enough to ride in cars with boys. Yes, that was a rule in my home, so that is where I start my "real" dating life.) 

Unfortunately for my generation as well as those up-and-coming generations, this is a tradition that is making its way to the highest shelves along with those of days gone by. Fortunately, I am not the only one to have noticed this, or to have experienced a lack of real dating in their life. Apparently, at least Alex Williams, among countless women sitting around with their girlfriends on countless Saturday nights bitching about men, dating, and their considerable lack of a love life have noticed, too.

The question of why dating habits and traditions are changing has been chalked up to the ever-increasing technological factor of our lives. The Internet. Cell phones. Text messaging. Email. Facebook. All of these conveniences are taking away the need for a “first date” and giving those entering the dating pool a false sense of intimacy.

I do it all the time. Just read my “Super Stalkers” post and you will see just how easy it is to find out information about a person from the internet. It’s crazy. I can look up a guy’s favorite bands, TV shows, movies, and who his friends and relatives are. I can see how he interacts with those people…specifically other girls.

What does that leave us to talk about? What if it’s a blind date? What does he have left to ask me or talk to me about because we both know that one or both of us has looked the other one up and already knows the answer to the question we’re asking (a personal pet peeve of mine). So why even ask?

Unless you have already known each other for a while and have established some sort of relationship or common ground whether that is a mutual friend or hobby or interest or background, these things can get pretty awkward. And that is a huge understatement.

If you’re anything like me, your lack of dating experience makes you mildly insecure, nervous, and unsure of how you’re supposed to act, what you’re supposed to do or say or talk about. I always struggle with letting new people (men or women, dates or friends) see certain sides of my personality in the beginning. It definitely depends on the comfort level and the environment.

Let’s face it. I’m weird. In fact, my sister tells me everyday – in the most loving way older siblings have. But it’s all about finding the weird that matches yours. With some men, my flirtatious, outgoing side is the first to be seen, with others, my sincere, quieter side. With still others, I am a complete and total goof ball. The man of my dreams can handle all of these sides of me and many more because, believe me, there are more. However, he must not merely be able to handle my countless quirks, and me but he must also embrace them and match me quirk for quirk.

Now finding this dream man is a herculean task in itself, and as my friends and family can attest to I have put serious effort into a lot of different types of men to find the right one for me. I don’t know if I have found him yet or if he’s still out there waiting somewhere wondering where I am, but what can be said about making our way to one another is that the dating game has different rules and standards.

In today’s world, men are not the only ones who make the first move. Some women, a lot of women even, ask men out before they are asked (just see my “There's a Reason Why Girls Don't Do This” post for the alternative outcome of that situation). Women are not stuck to the phone awaiting the call that may or may not come, though some are. Kissing on the first date is a personal preference to do or not do.

So many things are different from the way they once were that it seems as if all caution were thrown to the wind the minute the flower children entered the world and brought the children of the 90s to life. Oh, what has become of us?

Things are so confusing now! As someone who is routinely told by those who know me well that I am an “old soul”, yet who is also very much a product of the times I grew up in, it is even more confusing.

I am traditional at heart. I want to be courted. I want romance. I want thought to be put into a relationship with me. I want the effort to be made to seek me out, not as just another girl because his usual Thursday night booty call wasn’t available and he thought he’d see where I stood on that matter. (Here’s your answer: Call someone else.)

On the other hand, a traditional first date can be and is intimidating to me, especially if I don’t know the guy very well. I am very much a girl when it comes to these things. I agonize over what I am going to wear and what that outfit portrays about me and whether it is the message I am trying to send. I wonder if he’s going to like me, or my style, or my personality – not necessarily in that order. I wonder what we are going to talk about and what happens if we run out of things to say. I think about the end of the night – to kiss or not to kiss.

So, with all that said, group outings on the first “date” are definitely not on my list of “don’ts” for dating. Seeing a guy interact with other people, his friends, my friends, mutual friends, strangers, waiters, etc. gives me time to observe, to gauge his personality, his likes and dislikes and to decide if further exploration is worth the nerves of a first one-on-one date.

If in this stream-of-consciousness post you have not reached a conclusion about me, let me give it to you straight. I am just as confused as every other man or woman navigating the waters of the dating pool. There are plenty of fish in the sea, so they say. Yet, the way in which we catch the right one with just the right kind of weird as us is so different from ten, twenty, thirty, fifty years ago that we are left to doggy paddle our way through, hoping and praying like hell that we can keep our heads above water and not drown.

I have no idea what I am doing or how I will meet the man of my dreams.

If I believe my dad, I am going to have an unconventional relationship.

If I believe my favorite teacher, I will meet the guy, fall in love, and be engaged in six months.

Whoever is or isn’t right about how my love story will go, one thing is for sure – my dating experience has been and will be vastly different from the generations before me.

My question is: will things and people turn around at some point in the future, perhaps in my lifetime, and see the value in dating more traditionally?

A Sniff Down Memory Lane

“I just got back to work, sat down, and got a huge whiff of Water Baby.”

This is the email I sent to my sister after returning from the gym. We had just taken what we termed, The Insanity Class (not to be confused with the actual Insanity workout. I just found it insane and extremely difficult not to do the “easy” exercise options just to make it through the entire 30 minutes).

“You’re so weird,” she laughed at me.

“I know, but it really does. There’s a hint of My Little Pony, too, but mostly Water Baby.”

The same smell came wafting to my nose the next day. I thought it might have been one of my co-workers putting on some lotion, but there was no telltale rubbing of the hands.

I certainly wasn’t going to ask, which would only lead to me explaining, “No, it does not bother me. It just happens to smell exactly like my childhood doll, the Water Baby,” who was named - depending on the day – Julie, Sarah, Mary Kate, or Ashley. (Yes, all four of those names refer to the Olsen twins. The two former names were from a movie called To Grandmother’s House We Go. I was obsessed – with the movie, with Full House, with the Olsen twins. It was a phase. Who could blame me though, really? They were awesome when I was 5).

Anyway, the smell came again to my nose and I started sniffing around. Turns out, it was my deodorant (read: my sister’s deodorant that I used 15 minutes before). Mystery solved. Mary Kate and Ashley would be so proud.

So I emailed my sister to tell her that I figured out where the Water Baby smell had come from.

All she did was laugh.

However, the point of this little story is not that my sister owns and uses deodorant that smells like my Water Baby. The point is that this happens to me quite often, and, I am convinced, to others as well. The difference between said other people and me: I verbalize the smell and the correlation it made with a memory of a person, place, or thing in my mind as can be seen from the aforementioned anecdote.

I routinely walk unsuspecting down a street, into a room, past a store or a person, and am met with an onslaught of odors and fragrances that bring about just as many memories – most good, some not-so-good.

Just for fun I’ll give you some examples.

The classics: freshly cut grass, cupcakes just out of the oven, and the metallic smell of blood (okay, the last one may be odd, but anyone who has ever had a bloody nose knows exactly what I’m talking about).

The oddities: the smell of my childhood friend’s house; the natural musk mixed with the fabric softener of my ex; the cologne of my high school crush or grandpa; the play-dough and finger paints of pre-school;  the crayons and construction paper of kindergarten; the perfumes of my pre-school teacher, mom, and sister; the fishy smell of the Jack-and-Jill bathroom of my college dorm which I shared with two Asians (Don’t ask, I choose to believe it was the food they cooked in their room.); and rain coming on a summer evening.

There are undoubtedly more, but these are the scented memories that come to mind at a moment’s notice.

They – whoever they are – say that smell is one of the last senses we lose. I find this a comforting thought because so many of these smells are associated with fond memories I hold in my heart.

So next time you walk into a room or past someone and your nose leads you back down memory lane, follow it, and maybe share the story. You never know what good or laughter could come from doing so.