cuffing season?

I just finished watching Pretty Woman, so not only am I in a fantastic mood, but I also believe in love again! 

I would never say I’ve been lucky in the romance department. I’ve done almost everything under the sun other than being in love. Secret rendezvous, casually dating, and everything else. I haven’t given up on the idea of love, but anyone living here could tell you the New York City dating scene is almost worse than a World War I trench. Despite feeling tremendous amounts of misfortune when it comes to love, I’m not jaded towards it! In fact, I think all my heartbreak makes love so much more fun!

Earlier this month, I wrote about the ire I feel towards “situationships,” and I still stand by that statement. However, that doesn’t mean that romance has to be all boring and serious! In fact, one of my favorite romantic encounters was utterly unserious and lasted one month in the summer after 12th grade! I never actually dated that man, but I still remember him fondly because of how fun our fling was.

Dating has become more of a method of psychological torture than just something to have fun with. I’m not saying that you should play with people’s emotions, but it shouldn’t feel like life or death. You shouldn’t imagine every person you talk to could be a potential spouse. Sometimes, romance is just the guy at a concert you pretend to be in love with for three hours, or the girl that reaches to grab the same vinyl as you in the record shop. 

Maybe it’s because social media makes it harder to keep a secret, or maybe it has something to do with cell phones making it easy to contact a person anywhere at any time; either way, dating and love have become unnecessarily difficult and frustrating. No one wants to just have a casual fling anymore! Keeping tabs with your ex via Instagram is not conducive to moving on! 

All of my peers are younger than 25, so I seriously doubt we’ll be finding our forever person at this stage in our lives. If you do find a person you really want to go steady with, do so! If you don’t, then have fun doing all the things single people can do, like flirting with strangers and going on first dates! 

Ultimately, being stressed about finding a spouse has never actually helped anyone find one. Watch a rom-com, scroll on dating apps for fun, compliment a stranger! Find love in silly little ways, and just be patient! Everything happens as it’s meant to!

love you always (especially today),

malaika <3