I often have to think about the fact that writing about my dating life is maybe, just maybe, effectively ruining it.
There’s a danger when interests, or well, life activities, fall into your line of work: I used to love to watch TV shows and now find I can’t focus on popular series people are obsessively watching because my brain doesn’t mindlessly enjoy TV shows anymore. I’ve grappled with writing about dating and how much I share about my journeys online — is it too much? Is it a red flag to men? Will I look back on this in 10-15 years and cringe, just like I did with my old Tumblr or tweets? Will I one day meet someone, fall madly in love, and then have them read these newsletters and fake their own death to get away from me?
But against better judgement, here I am. The pressing thing on my mind lately? The whole ‘opposites attract’ theory.
There are a few certain things in life: taxes, death, and me overthinking and preparing for a situation before it even happens.
I mainly think I am fairly good at getting a read on people. That is a super wanky thing to say but it’s really because I’m nosy. I’m curious about others’ lives - particularly their love lives - and I love finding out about people’s history, why they last broke up with their partner, where they see themselves in 10 years time, and what names they have planned out for their fur babies. I can only hope it comes across as somewhat charming vs. insanely annoying when I pepper people with such questions, but probably not.
Because I am a huge over-thinker, I’m also very good at talking myself out of why I shouldn’t date someone. I used to think it was just based on a good gut feeling, but I’ve also realised as someone who can be classified as an avoidant (I’m working on it!!) that it’s far easier for me to talk myself out of going on dates with people who aren’t my “usual type” vs. trying new things.
Which ultimately led me to this date. “He’s not my usual type,” I said to my friends, who usually make fun of me about my usual type being flighty, charismatic, tattooed, British men who suffer from Peter Pan syndrome. Dating out of my usual type at this stage is probably a good thing. A rejoiced thing, even.
It was when we sat on our first date, sipping on margaritas that I realised not only was the guy not my “usual” type, we simply had… nothing in common.
“Opposites attract,” I thought to myself as each revelation of how truly opposite we were came up. “Opposites attract?” I questioned to a friend in a quick desperate message while my date had gone to the bar.
“Opposites attract?” I yelled at my Oodie when I got home, before pretending it was a real person and snuggling up to it to drift into a fretful sleep.
This date was a while ago now but it sprung to mind recently when I was at a Northlane gig last week, watching the couple in front of me headbang in time to ‘Carbonized’. Two people unknowingly in that moment defied the whole notion of ‘opposites attract’ to me. There was something oddly beautiful about it that had me feeling all wistful. At the end of the day, don’t we just want to be with someone who has some sort of shared interests or passions, someone who would excitedly grab your hand when the breakdown at a gig hits?
Well, OK, maybe not everyone wants that, but I digress.
Anyway here’s the story of uh, date three of… 100? (This was a failed experiment from the start.)
The whole tally including the friends I’ve been doing #100datesof2022 with stands at about 16 I think. We’ve tried. Kinda.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Shit Straight Men Say to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.