Is it really so much to ask?

So
the thing I don’t understand about dating is this: I don’t understand why it is
so much of a rush.

Girl
meets boy. Boy suggests a drink. Girl says okay. Boy and girl sit opposite each
other for the duration of a beverage and have to decide if they are going to
kiss by the time they finish it. GO.

Scenario
one: girl thinks nope. Don’t want to kiss
him. Boy thinks she is not interested. The story ends as soon as the
Guinness does.

Scenario
two: girl thinks okay. I’d quite like to
kiss him. Boy understands she is interested. The next date, date number
two, doesn’t only end with kissing, then, but starts with it too, in order to
establish that this is definitely romantic intention.

The kissing,
at some point, be it on date two or three or four, leads to rumpy pumpy,
because sex is fun, especially when the other person makes you laugh. Except,
then the sex becomes sleeping over, because it’s just easier that way, and
normally in those heady early stages it becomes sleeping over a lot.

The
dating becomes an excuse for the bonking, at worst, and at best an added bonus.
Love happens in 0.032% of all cases. A minuscule amount. I mean, that’s no
reason not to play hide-the-salami. Nu-uh. But sex doesn’t mean love, let’s
just be clear on that.

It
can be nice to pretend sometimes though. 

But. HERE’S
THE THING. Scenario one might not mean a girl isn’t interested. It might mean
the very opposite. It might mean that she is actually incredibly interested, otherwise she’d go home with you right now
and then simply never call again (hi.).
Maybe the thought of kissing the boy means cementing that interest beyond what
she feels right now, though, which isn’t the damp beating of the heart between
her legs but more of a yes. I want to
drink more beverages with you.

Why
is there no option for that on the first date feedback form? No worries of
kissing and groping and even come-back-to-mine-ing,
just, yup. This was fun. Let’s have more fun at opposite sides of a table
without tasting each very soon.

Why
is there no option for let me see your
life? An option for oh, so that’s how
you treat the waitress at a restaurant, and hmmmm, that’s who you spend quiz nights at the pub with, and I’m sorry. I really don’t think your
knowledge of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is more extensive than mine since we’ve
watched every season together and your Giles impression still sucks ass.

I
think the word I am looking for, way back here in 1953, is courting. I want to know why courting
isn’t an option.

I
call London dating disposable dating. If
the guy doesn’t know his Merlot from his Malbec, or the gal her Kerouac from
her Keats, or some other arbitrary criteria goes unfulfilled, it’s on to one of
the eleventy bagillion other singles looking for a warm body and a giggle.

I
don’t want it. It’s too much, too soon. I don’t want to decide here, in this
pub, with the music too loud and the people too trendy whether this will be the
beginning. I want weeks and months of gentle discovery, clues on the treasure
map, a journey that we silently agree to take together where first our minds
graze purposefully/accidentally up against each other, and then our hearts find
the courage to gently hold the other, in the quiet, on a slow walk home in the
dark. Our bodies will be the last piece to fall into place, not the first, neck
on the crook of an arm, comfortably nestled up against something real,
something genuine, the satisfaction of delayed gratification worn like a
blanket of memories already made, histories already entwined, present perfect,
looking in the same direction.

I
want Javier Bardem to be reading the newspaper opposite me, sneaking glances as
we digest yet another dinner jointly cooked before he takes the book from my
hands, lovingly folds over a corner to mark my page and says, “Darling, it’s time.”

The
second thing is, though, that I don’t know where to find my Javier, my bloke
that wants the same. And I know that’s the point- that the very definition of
finding him will mean he is the right one to buy trinkets from the museum for,
the right one to trouble myself in learning his favourite cake.

But
in the meantime I’m waiting. And probably, what I really mean is, is that if
you see him, maybe even looking for me too, tell him I’m ready to avoid looking
him in the eye, and to have him teach me how to use chopsticks, and to not
kiss, out of choice, because I like him so much I’m scared, until the moment
when I really can’t bear not to anymore. 

Want to say something about this post?

- Twitter.

- Facebook.

- Email.