He'll Pay For This
Audio version, read by me below, or listen to it as a podcast (at higher speeds) here
I’m sitting down having brunch on a date with an attractive woman, and everything, so far, is perfectly fine.
Let’s call her Rose. We matched on Tinder. Her profile looked as though it had been tailor made to catfish me; her bio read that she was into science fiction novels, ballet and painting - that she was looking for a smart athletic guy with a sense of humour. I am that guy.
After some back and forth messaging on Tinder, and then on Instagram, I suggested that we grab coffee. She replied that coffee sounded too corporate, and suggested brunch as an alternative, to which I agreed.
And here we are.
We hit it off immediately. The common ground, as promised, is there. I learn that she’s recently worked as a teacher in an impoverished school - she speaks passionately about the kids she taught and how she was moved by the experience. She’s smart and intense in a way that I like.
I talk a bit about comedy and just generally goof around. She seems to find me quite funny. At one point, I make a joke - as she’s biting into her pancakes - that makes her laugh so much she nearly coughs them up entirely.
The restaurant initially forgets my order, remembering hers, but it’s no big deal as we’re happily chatting. 30 minutes after sitting down I finally get my eggs which I inhale as we continue to talk. It’s a sunny day, and as she’s talking, roughly an hour into our conversation, I’m sold. I verbalise internally, almost word for word “hey this is the kind of person I’d really enjoy dating”.
90 minutes into the date, long after we’ve finished eating, I ask if she wants to leave the restaurant to go for a stroll around the local green. She glances at her watch, saying that she has a bit of time, and happily agrees. We get the bill and - because of the aforementioned initial forgetting of my order - the restaurant deducts my order off the bill without me asking. We split the remainder evenly.
As we exit, she immediately starts walking in precisely the opposite direction to the green which we just agreed to walk around. I’m about to crack a joke about her sense of direction when she turns abruptly and says “I think I’m actually going to go home now”.
All the humour of the recent discussion has vanished in her expression. She is a good three feet away from me.
I reply, blankly, “OK, sure”. She asks me which way I walk to go home, and I point in the opposite direction to where she was heading. She simply replies “OK bye” turns and leaves, her expression remaining neutral.
I stand there for a moment, stunned.
Now kids, I’ve had some brutal rejections in my time, but I was always somewhat prepared for the possibility. Harry Houdini was said to be able to receive all kinds of punishment to his abdomen without injury. What killed him however, was in fact a surprise punch from a fan - one he didn’t know to brace for. This felt like it came out of nowhere. Up until 30 seconds ago, I was under the full impression we were having a good time and that there was mutual chemistry. I proceed to walk home dazed, half crumpled over. I replay the conversation repeatedly - what happened?
I consider many possibilities - I had ducked to the bathroom right before we left, maybe she had received some bad news while I was gone? During the brunch we hadn’t talked about anything controversial - no politics, no religion, not even a mention of the impending apocalypse - so I don’t think I could have offended her accidentally. Perhaps I was just boring?
My sister is at home when I arrive back unexpectedly early. Still concussed, I relay the events to the best of my recollection to her, asking for her sage wisdom on what might have occured. Aside from the ‘bad news’ hypothesis, my sister gently raises a possibility - that Rose left because I didn’t pay the entire bill.
I laugh this off. This couldn’t possibly be true. It’s 2020, not 1920.
Obviously, I would have been happy to pay for both of us, rather than just pay for myself - the brunch clocked in at just under £13 total - hardly a sum worth stressing about. Though I’ll admit, it wasn’t even something I had considered at the time. I had always been told that a man paying for a meal/drinks etc on the very first date was an old-fashioned, and antiquated, way of dating.
Despite my certainty that my sister’s explanation for Rose’s sudden departure simply couldn’t be correct, the idea gnaws at me. After a couple of hours, I decide I need to know definitively. I send a carefully scripted message to Rose which reads as follows:
She responds:
Reading this, a lot goes through my mind.
Primarily I’m aghast. I want to reply with something sarcastic but alas, I relent, pause, and consider.
Firstly, she just turned and left without saying a word about this at the time. Her paying for her own food - no, less than that, because of the deduction of my food from the bill she paid less than what she ordered - was an immediate dealbreaker? She left because she paid barely £6.50 - this feels both entitled and cheap.
Secondly, she claims I invited her to brunch, but in fact I suggested we both get coffee - brunch was her idea. Would she have expected me to pay had she suggested a fancy dinner? Is that how dating works?
Thirdly, the idea that it’s only a date if a guy pays feels absurd. No, it’s not matching on tinder, the flirting, or anything else - so long as the man doesn’t foot the bill it’s platonic. This feels like a loophole many unfaithful partners could exploit.
But, simultaneous to the narrative that she was in the wrong, I had an alternative one running through my brain. It creeped down my spine and sat heavy in my gut. Perhaps it was, in fact, all my fault.
Should there be the expectation that a man, in 2020, pays for the first date?
Reading this, you might think this is a fairly trivial thing to write about.
Prior to this experience, I would have agreed wholeheartedly. However, I’ve found that this seemingly innocuous part of dating between men and women reveals a lot regarding what people think about wider themes of feminism and masculinity.
When asking women about this question, I received a wide variety of answers. However, most men I asked almost universally took what we could perhaps call the pragmatic view, replying with some form of:
“hey man, whatever works” coupled with “it’s not worth getting into”
I.e. always offer to pay, and assume you might have to. If I pushed further, two views emerged. Some guys felt it wasn’t worth discussing what could be perceived to be an inconsistency in modern dating standards when it came to men and women - they wanted to get ze gurl rather than debate feminism.
Others said they simply felt, at their core, that paying for a date is just “the right thing to do'' as a man.
I expect most readers to fall broadly into one of two groups:
You agree with feminism - and perhaps even identify as part of the movement. All people should be treated equally, and because of that, regardless of whether it’s a man dating woman, two women going on a date, or two men, or two of any sex or gender, there should be no asymmetrical expectations - as a default - of who should pay (presuming no-one had literally said in advance let me buy you a meal). It’s not anti-feminist to buy someone a meal, or have someone buy a meal for you on a first date - people can do whatever they want. It’s just not the default assumption of how things should be. You believe that while Rose was free to reject me for whatever reason she likes, I wasn’t wrong to want to split it.
(You’re generally left-wing, consider yourself liberal, and you’re slightly more likely to have dyed your hair at one point.)You agree with feminism, that ‘men and women are equal’ but, like, you know, it’s complicated. You think that, really, I should have at least offered to pay, if not just paid outright.
(You generally enjoy the traditional roles that historically exist, or at least aspects of them. You’re the men who enjoy paying on a date because “it’s the right thing to do” and the women who happily are paid for, because while yes you want to be treated equally and you’re more than happy to pay, you also want to be treated. You don’t believe there’s any contradiction between seeing men and women as equal and expecting men to pay, perhaps rationalising that “men and women are equal, but different”. Or maybe you do believe that there’s a slight contradiction but you just write it off as one of those things. You’re probably more central politically and likely enjoy more ‘old-fashioned’ romance. You probably think that Baby It’s Cold Outside is a fine song)
The problem here is not so much that one of these groups is wrong (though I think it’s pretty clear which one I resided in at the time), rather, that we all reside in the same dating pool.
Feminism
My expectation that on a first date you split the bill I learned mostly at University. Over the years, both women I dated and feminist friends informed me at great length, on numerous occasions, that - all things being equal - a man paying for a meal on a first date with a woman was something we, collectively, didn’t do anymore. If anything, some said, it was actively unattractive. It suggested that the man was buying a woman’s time, or that she wasn’t capable of paying for herself. It could be received as demeaning, patronising and had echoes of the dominant-patriarchal tendencies which - I was told - we’re all trying to get past. Plus, it was so heteronormative. What about the huge amount of dates that aren’t simply a man and a woman? It’s one thing if someone literally offers to take you out for dinner, but generally people are simply mutually agreeing to meet. As such, expecting a guy to pay is simply archaic. This all made sense to me, and I agreed with it.
There were, of course, pragmatic exceptions to this always-split rule. Dates between students are one thing, but if you’re dating a student while you have a job it’s another - it can make sense to offer to foot the bill simply because one of you is earning, while the other is not. I’ve happily done this many times with this rationale in mind.
I’d been out of university a while, and it occurred to me rather starkly that perhaps I had been living in a liberal bubble my entire life. Maybe I’d been misled by all my previous experiences, or missed the memo when transitioning to dating from your early 20’s to your late 20’s. Perhaps in Rose’s mind I was the cheap one. I didn’t offer to pay the bill. It was only £13 - which isn’t bad at all for a London brunch. The fact that the sum was so small could have added insult to injury. I would have been conveying something like “this was so boring I’m not even going to pay for this cheap brunch” which would explain why she left so quickly.
So naturally, I asked almost every single one of my friends and family members for their take. I begged female friends for guidance in particular, my physics degree did not prepare me for this.
What was immediately striking to me was that all of my female friends described themselves as being a feminist (with the notable exception of one) yet had often arrived at completely opposing views on whether a man should pay on a first date or not. To make matters more confusing all of them said that their view was the definitive feminist party line take on the matter.
Throughout these discussions, I remained unconvinced that - from a feminist perspective - one can rationalise the default expectation that a guy should pay (without invoking reparations). My close friend Diane, in particular, disagreed, and gave the following argument on how her expectations that a guy should pay wasn’t inconsistent with her feminist outlook.
She argued that there exist, quite obviously, established gender roles which people should be free to adhere to as much or as little as they like. It’s not anti-feminist to want to be paid for on a date, in the same way that it’s not anti-feminist to want to pay for all your dates should you so desire. Women should be free to take any role they so wish (as should men).
All of this, I agreed with 100%. The whole point of any form of equality is surely as much about equal treatment as it is equal opportunity - in this case, the freedom to have whatever kind of relationships you want, assuming all relevant parties are on the same page. We agreed that it’s just as valid for a feminist to want a sugar daddy as it is for them to be sugar mommy - and not at all any of our business.
The only place we disagreed, was what the default expectations should be.
To my mind, if you’re truly starting from a place assuming no particular roles, and that both parties are equal, it shouldn’t be the default assumption that a guy will, or should pay - any more that you shouldn’t assume a random date will be your sugar daddy/mommy.
To Diane’s mind, everyone’s default may be different, but it’s an acceptable feminist position to assume the man will pay in a gesture of courtship.
And that’s where we left it.
Conflict
I relayed the story of Rose to one of my closest friends - Trish - expressing my utter confusion and, honestly, frustration at what had happened. She’s a proud feminist and all too happy to call me out on my shit. To my relief, she broadly agreed with my sentiments - finding it hilarious that someone would throw away the chance of getting to know someone, or indeed, a relationship, for having to pay over £6.
Notably however, she did concede that “I like it when men offer to pay, and I know I shouldn’t find it attractive, but I do”.
That Trish admitted there was a discrepancy between these two aspects of her - what she intellectually desired as a feminist and emotionally desired as a person, was relieving to me. I entirely related to it.
Evidently, we’re seldom fully rational creatures, conflicted feelings are the norm, rather than the exception. A part of me would enjoy having someone buy me brunch on a first date, but it would mostly make me uncomfortable for the same reasons my feminist uni friends cited - I’d feel like I owed the person something, that I was being bought and so on. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with having mixed feelings, so long as one admits there’s a conflict.
Economics
My discussion with Trish led to many, many others, where this question was evaluated, in great depth, through a variety of lenses. One of the more notable arguments I came across was an economic one - that men should pay for a first date because there’s typically more of an opportunity cost for a woman - timewise - than there is for a man. With modern dating apps almost all women have an easier time finding a date than most men.
I recall one particular female friend showing me a push notification she got from Tinder, congratulating her that she had been swiped right on 25,000 times.
Yes, this notification exists.
She could have a date a day for 60 years and still not get through all of those matches. Given how many options she has, maybe she damn well should expect a bloke to pay for her meal. Most men I know lunge for the phone if they get even just one match.
Taking this line of thinking however leads to the very shady territory of valuing people purely by how physically attractive they are, or making some basic assumptions about what half the population want, which seems like directions we don’t want to head into.
Instead, discussions always came back to the fundamentals - men and women, feminism and masculinity.
Men and Women
In a sense, Diane is right. In almost every society, both modern and historic, men and women are treated differently on some level. The recent trajectory of western society has - and I think almost everyone would agree that this is a good thing - moved towards shrinking these differences in treatment across most categories - rights, opportunities and so on.
But the gap between how we treat men and women isn’t zero across everything yet - and many don’t think it should be. The question then becomes, I suppose, of what differences in treatment and expectation we want to keep, if any.
Some will be quick to interject at this point with something along the lines of “there are unavoidable biological differences between men and women, and so there always will be - and should be - a difference in how we treat them”. It’s hard to proceed any further in discussing this question without having to define terms a little bit more precisely - what exactly do we mean by calling someone a ‘man’ and a ‘woman’ anyway? Should we think of it purely genetically? Or is it mostly cultural and arbitrary? After all, all categories are arbitrary to some extent - we invent them as tools to help serve us in the world, and so we should change how we define them if we find a better definition that’s more useful.
I think we can sidestep this question of what we mean by ‘man’ and ‘woman’ however - at least in this case - by asking “is having different expectations for the categories of ‘men’ and ‘women’ (however you define them) in the context of dating, a good thing?”
Masculinity
My friend Sam, another friend from university, had an interesting take on the whole thing. This was informed by her recently spending a year in Italy working as an au pair. She described being on her first Italian date - a dinner - and instinctively trying to split the bill with the man (because, obviously, that’s what you do) only to find him offended. Whether this was because he would take it as an offence to his masculinity, or whether he read it as her saying "oh this wasn't a date" she wasn't sure. She simply said that from then on she simply let the guys pay - it was the done thing over there. It wasn’t worth getting into.
Is this a thing men should do? Is this an inherently masculine thing? Looking at the definition of masculinity on Wikipedia offers the following:
“Although masculinity is socially constructed, research indicates that some behaviors considered masculine are biologically influenced. To what extent masculinity is biologically or socially influenced is subject to debate.”
Even if masculinity turned out to be mostly biologically influenced, rather than culturally created, I’m not sure it should matter. The argument that ‘something is natural so we should adhere to it’ is weak. It’s the classic ‘is, ought’ fallacy. We tame other aspects of our nature for the betterment of society and ourselves, why wouldn’t this one be included?
And what does masculinity even mean anyway? If you move past the almost self-parodying stereotypes of muscle cars, big biceps and shades, you might - if pushed - arrive at traits like courage, tenacity, cheerfulness in the face of adversity, loyalty and comradery.
Think for but a few moments more however, and you’ll realise that these are just universal good traits of anyone - regardless of whether they’re a man or a woman. Robert Webb had it absolutely right - masculinity is generally a redundant term. All it really means, in most conversations, is not feminine - which is not a personality.
You know the types of men who take issue with this - the kind of men who, on occasion, will go on great diatribes on what it means to be a man - listing abstract qualities and stereotypical interests. What I suspect these guys need is not a better model of masculinity, so much as a hug.
I was lucky. Growing up, my father - my primary male role model - consistently said to me “Be your own man”. When asked for clarification on what this meant, he elaborated that he basically meant that I should become someone I was proud to be. It’s because of this, that the notion of ‘masculinity’ was never really something that I thought about a lot. Pretty early on in my childhood it was apparent that I wasn’t sporty or brash, but more nerdy and introverted - and I was exceptionally comfortable with that.
Even during the height of my eating disorder, when I had next to no testosterone and corresponding zero sexual drive or interest, I didn’t feel less of a man in any way. My concern was not for my ability to have sex, but rather, for my brain. My father gave me the gift of defining what being a man was to me. He tells my sister to be her own person. It’s the same advice (and more recently, readers may be happy to note, he has become even more progressive, telling both of us to be our own person),
Not all guys are so lucky. The magnitude of problems facing men in society today are incomparable to those women have faced historically, but I think it’s still important (and useful to everyone) to recognise the former. For instance, there’s great awareness of the impossible and unrealistic beauty standards for women in the media, but what is less often recognised is the media’s portrayal of masculinity.
Almost every man you see in the media is in great shape, wealthy, confident, extroverted and charismatic - i.e., a certain character type. Sure, some celebrities are deficient in one of these traits, but it normally means they’re hyper-accomplished in another. Whether it’s Elon Musk, A-list actors or soon-to-be-ex-Presidents (yes, for some he exemplifies a masculine man) almost all successful men in some way embody an extreme. Growing up, the way to win is to out-do, rather than not-do. Please, show me the stay-at-home dad celebrity who is considered ‘manly’ or the famous guy who isn’t trying to maximise every second of productivity out of his day.
I sometimes wonder if part of the reason why some men are so fragile when it comes to their masculinity - sweating over anything from paying for dates to earning more than their partners - is because now they feel like they don’t just have to compete with other men, but other women too. Which, of course, is absurd - but if your idea of masculinity is tied to notions of providing for your family or monetary success as opposed to something like spending time with your family or life satisfaction then you might feel forced to double-down on certain aspects that are culturally considered ‘masculine’ - perhaps making them toxic (by the same logic, it’s not so much that these traits are inherently toxic, rather, that any trait taken to an extreme is toxic). This might be exacerbated when there is a lack of media portrayals of men in a positive light who embody other traits, rather than extremes of classical ‘masculine’ ones.
In researching feminism, I was slightly envious at the materials available. Some of the books I came across - mostly at the recommendation of friends - included The Guilty Feminist by Deborah Frances-White (based off of the podcast of the same name) and Women Don’t Owe You Pretty by Florence Given. Reading through the latter, in particular, I was struck by how much of the advice would be good advice for anyone, regardless of who they were.
Anecdotally, the popular literature and public discourse aimed at men seems to more overtly contain mixed messages. A recent example of this occurred when Harry Styles had a photoshoot published in Vogue where he was wearing a dress. Many people thought this was great - and didn’t make him any less of a man (perhaps even more of one, given his confidence). However, a tweet by Candace Owens - a Conservative commentator - went viral, which read “There is no society that can survive without strong men...bring back manly men”. The tweet by Vogue which published the photos, at this time of writing, has just under 81,000 likes. Candace Owens’ tweet has over 113,000. Styles went on to tweet “Bring back Manly men” with a picture of him eating a banana in an frilly jacket, which has well over a million likes.
Books are just as mixed. For every book that wants to get away from the stiff-upper-lip old-fashioned ideas of masculinity - titles such as Reinventing Masculinity: The Liberating Power of Compassion and Connection there are dozens of titles which contain some form of ‘Alpha Male’ type phrasing or ‘No More Mr Nice Guy’. Even just typing in the word ‘masculinity’ into Amazon, for me at least, comes up with a book entitled - and I’m not kidding - If Masculinity is 'Toxic', Call Jesus Radioactive.
I’m more of a Women Don’t Owe You Pretty kind of guy. As such, I’d like to suggest a spiritual sequel aimed at my male counterparts - Men Don’t Owe You Brunch.
Maybe in my confusion, I’ve got this all backwards. As much as dating norms and expectations about men and women are restrictive, you could just as easily view them as liberating. I doubt there’s a soul on Earth who hasn’t been on a date and thought to themselves “What the hell do I do here?” Having a part to play - however old and antiquated, can give a map to chart what is an endlessly confusing territory.
Perhaps we can liken this whole dating norm situation to a high school dance. We’re all out there, awkwardly, on the dancefloor, trying to dance with someone. Except, there are more dances than ever - old fashioned ones with the male leading and woman following. Modern ones with different rhythms and steps, or even three people. The lights are dark, and there’s a strobe light. You encounter another person - and you’re desperately trying to work out what the other person is grooving to without stepping on their toes, all the while trying to appear like a competent dancer yourself. Sure you could in theory just ask them what dance they like, but a competent dancer wouldn’t need to, so you don’t.
On the one hand, there’s an advantage in having a singular dance that you do - the other person can get with the program, or move on elsewhere. The disadvantage is obvious - you might turn away a lot of really good people.
But I suspect that - to a certain extent - you don’t really mind which dance you do, at least at first. Maybe you’re less interested in the steps, and more interested in finding a person you like dancing with - much like Whitney, you just wanna dance with somebody. As such, you might lead with one dance, but you want to leave room to pivot to another. But you can’t approach someone without on some level dancing. Is your tinder/bumble/hinge overtly sexual or forthright? If you’re super flirty does that rule out the kind of person you’d want to be with long term? Or is that the necessary opening waltz? Do you pay for brunch as a dynamic opening move just to show you can? What does that say?
To make matters even more complicated we each have our own stories we tell ourselves about what love, romance or dating is and what we want out of it. For many, this isn’t a dance. For some, it’s a hunt. Or they’re on the prowl. Or they’re searching for their prince or princess. Or the one.
And then outside of all of that we have what we crave on a much deeper level. This is of course, the perennial issue of chemistry vs compatibility. The former seems to be more innate - possibly dictated by early childhood experiences of what we had or lacked growing up. The latter is, ostensibly, thought through. What we find carnally attractive may be mostly set, no matter how much we intellectually refute it. If anything, simply trying to do so might exacerbate the urge - kind of like how knowing you shouldn't find a joke funny only makes you laugh that much harder.
We’re lucky if these desires align, but I expect that for many - including myself and my friend Trish - they often don’t. Perhaps intellectually we want someone who is loving, kind, nice, and relaxed - but on a more carnal level we desire someone who is prone to bouts of rage, who is maybe a little mean, and a bit chaotic. Maybe we tell ourselves that we want a modern, respectful, progressive man or woman in the streets, but really, we want a more old-fashioned partner in the sheets. Of course, you get to pick - but you might end up fantasising either way; about a partner who splits the bill and treats you with respect, or one who really doesn’t.
In the end, I replied to Rose.
I said that for me it was a date, and apologetically explained that paying the entire bill just wasn’t an instinct for me - that I didn’t mean to offend. She replied that perhaps she was old-fashioned, and that she’d never demand someone to pay (which felt self-evidently untrue, but alas).
Maybe in an effort to prove I wasn’t cheap, or just in an effort to understand this person more, I offered to buy her dinner as an ‘actual date’. She agreed. My friends chastised me for this, saying I was being naïve, but I was trying to be more open minded.
Sure, the idea that I had to pay for a meal for it to be a date - that it’s a price of entry rather than an act of generosity - didn’t quite sit comfortably with me at first.
Eventually though, I decided, screw it. I’m going to sidestep this whole thing.
Rather than double-down on some masculine or feminist ideal, I resolved to simply double down on a universal good trait - generosity. For any further dates with Rose or otherwise - I will always default to offering to pay the bill initially, and then let the cards fall where they may. Whatever happens, happens.
At the end of the day, what I have to give a person, and what I like to receive is not money, but time. Attention, interest. Being there. The expensive things that cost nothing. Money is always a means to those ends, not the other way around. Money is undoubtedly important too , but I don’t care how much you spend - if your top currency of romance is money, you’re cheap. I’m not going to worry about it.
Yes, I’m sure some people take advantage of getting men to pay for their dates, being bought meals or experiences with no intention of reciprocating in any way. But this doesn’t bother me - at the end of the day, those vacuous people are the losers.
Rose and I ended up going on four more dates. On the whole, they were fun. It became all the more apparent that, on paper, we were absurdly compatible. She was even a gamer, and had played things like League of Legends and World of Warcraft- to seemingly, a greater extent than I ever did. A teenage dream. But by the fifth/fourth date, depending on how you count them, I wasn’t feeling it.
It dawned on me as we were sitting in a café. We were having a drawing-with-chocolates-and-coffee date at her suggestion - her treat.
As I sketched some astronauts, it slowly dawned on me that I was utterly replaceable. That I had served as a jovial, relaxed, mildly flirtatious stand-in for some fixed idea of what romance is. She would often refer to “things to do and not to do on a date” while on our dates, as if it were some formal thing. She had been upfront about what she wanted - she was looking for a smart athletic guy (perhaps an old fashioned one, willing to pay) and I decided to play him. She had done nothing wrong.
In all of my previous romances and relationships, I have undoubtedly played parts. I have been the dutiful boyfriend, the fun at the weekend, the feckless artist, the nerdy interest and so on. But in each of these interactions, I was not just an actor in, but a co-author of whatever narrative we were making.
All of my relationships have felt like acts of creativity between two people. The fun has not only been had in creating expectations, but subverting them, or reinventing them entirely. That act of creativity to me, in itself, is romantic.
If you don’t like the script, change the line. If you don’t like the dance, find the dance only you two can do. You get to decide, together, what labels you use, and what they mean. That’s a huge part of the joy of a relationship.
With Rose, I knew exactly what to say, and what she wanted. She had been very clear. She wanted a specific, old fashioned, choreographed dance - perhaps like ballroom. If I made a wrong move, she would waltz right out of there.
I’ve done ballroom dances before - both figuratively and literally. Initially it’s a thrill - it’s elegant and classy.
But at a certain point, it dawns on you that, in reality, you and your partner are spending the entire time looking and leaning away from each other. That one of you is always moving backwards, and that you’re both forever just on the edge of tripping over each other.
There are better dances.
There must be.
Several weeks later
I get a message on Hinge. Someone I matched with nearly a year ago hits me up, as if the conversation never stopped. I reply in turn. We share our grievances over the current global state of affairs. I lament that I’ve made no plans beyond a week because of the uncertainty of the world. She - very smoothly - asks me if I want to therefore make some plans with her within that time.
In our conversations she mentioned feminism and climate change, and that her photos are a bit inaccurate as she has only recently re-dyed her hair. I have a set of expectations
We meet at a pizza place for lunch. In her bag, I catch a glimpse of a book she’s reading - it’s Invisible Women by Caroline Criado-Perez. We eagerly discuss seatbelts, feminism and the environment. Soon we’re out of time, and as the bill comes, she gets out her purse from her bag as I get out my wallet.
I’m about to offer to pay, expecting her to insist on splitting it in return, given our mutual interests.
But then she does something entirely unexpected. She changes the game, and before I speak, she says “I’ll get this one if you get the next one?”
I was totally unprepared for this. Before I know it, I find myself saying “nono, I’ll get this one, you get the next one” and pay. She lets me.
We’re both delighted.