The Summer I Went Boy Crazy

As the end of summer approaches, I have had a bit of a volte-face around dating. Not a change of heart exactly, but a different approach. I started the summer convinced it would be the summer of love, but soon realized that approach would only lead to disaster. Still, I went a little boy crazy, before realizing that I was doing everything wrong. I thought I wanted the full rom-com, the giddiness, the chemistry, but of course the thing with rom-coms is that you rarely get to see what happens after they finally fall into bed together. It’s all about the sweeping love story leading to that moment, nothing to do with reality, nor what happens when real life intervenes. And the problem for those who believe that’s what love feels like, is that the sweeping love story rarely builds a healthy, lasting relationship. Great chemistry may feel delicious, but it’s usually your childhood wounds being activated by someone who unconsciously represents the worst of your childhood. That’s why you’re so drawn - you want to finally change their minds, except it never works.

Great chemistry has little to do with compatibility, but when you’re feeling all the feels, you don’t think about boring old things like compatibility, whether you actually like how they treat people, whether you actually like them. You see the red flags waving merrily in the wind, and you deliberately turn a blind eye, your willful wounded child refusing to listen to your wise adult self. Because nine times out of ten, when you are swept up in a giddy romance that feels like it’s out of a movie, the minute you fall into bed with them, just like the rom-coms, is when the curtain falls.

Because I’ve changed my approach, I have had a handful of lovely dates recently, lovely because they were none of those things. Instead, the dates were with entirely appropriate men - clever, curious, attractive, successful, solvent, age-appropriate - and lovelier still they weren’t giddy, or love-bomb-y. There was no talk of wanting to take me to bed, no one leaned over the table and tried to kiss me (thank the LORD). There was no behaviour that was disrespectful or inappropriate, just good conversation and a few shared stories, an agreement that perhaps we should do this again.

I was also struck by the realisation of how often I go into performative mode on dates. Even if I am not the slightest bit interested in them, I still want them to want me. I give them the full Janey G song-and-dance routine. I am impeccably made-up, with perfect hair. I sparkle and tell great stories; I perform. But three months of dating has taken it out of me. I’m exhausted. Now, I show up more naturally, with no expectations, merely a hope that we will have something to talk about. There is no Janey G show, and I think, I hope, I am finally able to show the real me to potential suitors, enjoy the time for what it is, rather than wondering whether this might be my person.

I write a lot about being chosen in Rewilding. How so many women are trained to be chosen, to do everything we can to make people choose us, consequently spending years moulding ourselves into all kinds of shapes and moulds in which we don’t quite fit in order to make ourselves more attractive, or more palatable. We do it with friends, we do it with colleagues, we do it with lovers. I have conquered doing it with friends and colleagues, but this summer showed me I still had work to do when it comes to romance.