I want to talk quickly about one pieces. I've been OBSESSED.
They're so easy breezy to plan and make my feel so cohesive, and there are so many possibilities in fashion right now. Overalls, jumpers, rompers. They're killing it.
Anyways, somehow this blog has turned into a sequence of thoughts, and that's not what I intended out of it, but it's all I have time to do right now and hopefully i'll have more focused posts up soon. That being said, I hope that someone somewhere finds these to be enjoyable or insightful or something.
I've been doing a lot of reading and listening to books and podcasts and friends on the subject and I feel like I just wanted to focus a topic i've been very aware of as a 20-something female in NYC these past couple years and that is dating. I want to also highlight that the experiences I go off of are rarely my own, but I am observant of male and female exchanges that occur whether they are in person or being recounted to me by my mass of girl friends. For the most part, I think apps are joke, primarily because I would never actually ever meet someone in person because i'm shy when meeting new people and a little scared of the potential killer on the other side of the keyboard. Let me be clear- I know that it's a totally normal thing and not dangerous, my best friend is married to her Tinder match, and I know plenty of people dating a fellow Bumble-ers who still have a pulses. Mostly, I think it's just not for me, i'm an old-fashion kind of girl who is still waiting for a special guy to literally ask me 'to go steady' in those terms. That is my dream.
That being said, I do find it fascinating.
I can't keep up, but my generation has found it as the norm and embraced it, even when people I know express their disapproval of this new norm, they adapt and reluctantly go to the app store in the hopes of finding love. Unfortunately this is making the 'organic' meeting become endangered. One of my friends stayed on the subway missing her stop just to witness a 'meet cute' which is an adorable story of how you meet your loved one which merits an 'awwwww' response from all those who ask the inevitable couple question 'how did you two meet?' (one which I am constantly asking in the hopes for some clues to navigate this single world). Another friend recently recounted a meet cute in an email she sent to Bumble about a missed connection gone wrong twice and an error in their app that resulted in the pair being unmatched without consent:
You see Bumble, I have this dream of meeting my dream man via a "meet cute" - bumping into each other on the subway, standing in line next to each other at the grocery store, reaching for the same tomato at the farmer's market, etc. You get the picture. A fairy-tale meeting that you only see in the movies. Well, I was so close, until all of these hopes and dreams were SHATTERED when he abruptly got off at the Myrtle-Willoughby stop, two stops before my own. So I chuckle to myself at the irony and bid the man adieu, never to be seen again...
UNTIL.
Fast forward three hours, I'm laying in bed swiping on Bumble, as part of my nightly ritual, when I SEE HIM.
So even people who are clearly romantics, like my friend who is clearly distraught about missing her opportunity to connect with someone whom she had a mutual connection, despite the fact she could have approached him in person in the first place. The dating app gave her the courage to do so in a way she was more comfortable. I don't blame her, i'm no expert in non modern dating and I totally would have done the same thing, but I feel that these apps have totally enabled this mentality, the want for 'meet cute' but the reluctance to make it happen on both of their ends. I have so many beautiful, talented, powerful women in my life who are single, and not necessarily by choice and I can't understand why.
When I was growing up, dating sites were something that people who were divorced or perpetually single did in order to find a mate. I never thought I would ever in my life be on a singles forum of any kind, and here I am at 24 and i've admittedly had short-lived accounts on Tinder, Hinge and Bumble. These apps are making us lazy daters because of all the possibilities, but they're also giving introverts a greater chance of finding love if they're able to actually meet these people aaaand they're pretty addictive.
Another thing about technology and online dating, there's been the creation of the 'ghosting' method where you flat out disappear when you don't want to talk to them anymore. Guess what? You have many social media accounts, and I know you're still alive, and its just cowardly. I've been on both sides of ghosting and it's awful. But in my experience, if you tell someone like it is and that you're just not interested, they are so appreciative of you being straightforward.
I know there are pros and cons to the evolution of dating to where it is today, but i'm on the cons side right now. So. What I want to change about the modern day dating community by Ricky&Leigh-
(1)
Approach people IRL and say something nice to them, faces are better than screens.
This is easier said than done.
(2)
If you don't want to talk to someone, let them know. Don't 'ghost' them.
It's just the kind thing to do.
That's it. That's all i'm asking.
Thanks for listening.
Thanks for listening.
