I’m always on the lookout for new and interesting material for you. Recently I stumbled across Dating or Something, a blog written by Emma Clery and Mademoiselle Reisz, two twenty-one year old college seniors who blog about their hookup experiences with insight and wit. Below I’ve posted an entry I especially liked, but you should head over there yourself and check out more of their writing. It’s gratifying to find women speaking openly and honestly about the challenging and humbling aspects of dating (or something) today.
My skull feels like it’s been crushed by a keg of cheap beer. I am in a bed. Plaid comforter. Not mine. Most interestingly, I am not wearing any clothing and there is an arm across my waist. I am facing the wall and I cannot see to whom the arm belongs. I vaguely remember flirting with the same guy the entire night before. I wanted to hook up with him. I hope and assume the arm is his, but I hesitate to turn over anyway.
I finally get it over with. I am correct. His eyes are sleepy, but they are the same pretty blue that my hazy memory recalls. I mumble something about clothes and he grabs me a pair of his shorts and a t-shirt and climbs back into bed. We talk for a bit. I think I am asking him the same questions about himself that I asked last night, but I don’t remember. He has a nice chest. I rest my head on it and it feels good. He strokes my back a little bit and I fall back asleep.
At 11:00 I get up and put my clothes back on. My friends later tell me that 11:00 is too late to stay – that I should’ve stumbled out as soon as I had my bearings, while he was still groggy. This, supposedly, minimizes awkwardness. But the thought of sneaking out early never crosses my mind. It doesn’t feel awkward to me. He wants to lay around in bed as much as I do. He’s still holding my waist, after all.
So at 11:00 I go to the bathroom. I have absolutely no recollection of hooking up with this guy last night. We didn’t have sex. I’d feel something if we did, and I feel nothing at all. I can hear the voice of a high school health teacher saying, “That’s not proof!” but I’m going to go with no. I am relieved. I have never had casual sex. I am pretty sure I don’t want to.
I walk back into the guy’s bedroom and he points out a contact case on his dresser. He says he gave it to me the night before so I wouldn’t have to sleep with my contacts in. This is nice. He intrigues me.
He walks me downstairs and outside. He doesn’t ask me for my phone number. Hmm. I walk home. I do not expect any future encounters with this guy to be awkward. He was nice and we cuddled all morning. If you can be no-longer-drunk and minimally dressed and lay in bed touching someone, it can’t be awkward, right? Besides, it isn’t a totally random hookup; we’re already Facebook friends.
I am wrong, of course. For some reason, even though he could wrap his hand around my waist in bed that sober morning and stroke the side of my stomach, in the weeks that follow he can’t say hi to me unless I force eye contact. He can’t have a normal, friendly conversation with me. But he can’t avoid me, either; we cross paths every Tuesday and Thursday between 10:00 and 11:30 classes, our groups of friends start to mingle regularly, and we run into each other at bars more often than not. It’s not a big school.
Why can’t he just act normal? I lament. I don’t get it. My friends shrug. That’s just how it is. People are awkward about random hookups. But we all – well, most of us – do it. So why can’t we just laugh about it afterwards instead? Or at least put it behind us and treat each other like civilized human beings?
I don’t get it. I’m not sure I ever will. I’ve been in serious relationships for most of college, so I never learned how to do this.
