My latest humiliating attempt at heterosexual love: I met a man named … let’s call him Dick—because, well, it’s my essay, so I can—in the third-floor bar of Nordstrom (his pick). He immediately fretted over the calorie count of a vodka soda, then later spent about 15 minutes describing how to make what he called “protein ice cream” in a Ninja Creami using cottage cheese and those sugar-free chocolate chips that give you diarrhea. It was awful. To be fair, I think he felt similarly about me after he asked, “What’s your relationship to fitness like?”, and I answered, ”I’m not in a relationship with fitness. That’s why I’m on a date.” If you think I’m being too mean or that this encounter was salvageable, I challenge you to try to sit next to a man who says the words “Ninja Creami” emphatically, and with a straight face, more than 15 times.
Needless to say, I’d originally met Dick on Bumble. Or Hinge. Or Tinder. I can’t remember anymore because they’re essentially all the same. It’s not breaking news that modern dating is essentially lying in your underwear swiping on people like a chain-smoking zombie at the slot machine. It’s the opposite of a romantic meet-cute. Case in point: I have a friend who catches up on Tinder correspondence only when she’s on the toilet. It’s actually amazing that Dick and I even met in person—most swiping, I’ve found, is just a quick exercise for a little hit of self-assurance. You match with a few people? Great, still got it. No need to actually pursue anything.
At some point in the last few frustrating months, I had the thought There has to be another way. Which led to the far more obvious thought that there is, in fact, another way: meeting someone in real life. As in, encountering someone in the world and making a move then and there, the way one presumably did before we all walked around with little rectangular, soul-sucking machines in our pockets. My parents met in 1968 at a Pair Extraordinaire concert. My grandparents, at a greasy spoon in St. Paul when my grandfather came over with chocolate milkshakes for my grandma and her sister. Two of my parents’ closest friends first locked eyes during a 30-second elevator ride.
It sounds lovely, but also incredibly old-fashioned, because it just might be incredibly old-fashioned. I have no idea whether people still actually do this, outside of, say, a Hallmark movie. All of my friends who are actively dating are dating online. But maybe there are people out there approaching attractive strangers in coffee shops and grocery stores, or sharing a sweet smile when their fingers accidentally graze as they’re both reaching to press the crosswalk button. (Sorry, having romantic fantasies.) Maybe it happens all the time, but, you know, just not to me. I couldn’t tell: Is it a local problem (me) or a global problem (the world)? There was a seemingly simple way to find out. I deleted my apps. Maybe I could meet someone the “organic, all-natural” way, to sound like the Los Angeleno I am.
I set some ground rules, obviously. I had to speak to one stranger every day outside my house. I wasn’t allowed to pull my phone out and do the crossword or look at Instagram when I was waiting for a latte or eating at a restaurant by myself. No headphones permitted when I was out on a walk. (I need to hear if my future beloved shouts, “Yo, Mama, looking good!”) Essentially I wanted to be present and available, and—this one was hard—to smile at people if they made eye contact. Have you tried this recently? Do you know how hard it is to smile at strangers who aren’t small, cute children without feeling like a huge sex pest? Or making them think you’re a huge sex pest? My first instinct when someone smiles at me is outright panic. Yes, I’m in therapy.
The first thing I noticed after a few days of keeping my phone in my pocket when I was out and about is that … absolutely no one else does this. I could try my best to lock eyes with every person at Blue Bottle Coffee, but to no avail. They were looking at TikTok or texting with friends. Once I even saw a cute-ish dude swiping through Hinge while waiting for his drink. Was I brave enough to approach him and say, “Heeeey, I’m on there too”? No, I was not. For the best, though, because that’s a very stupid line.
Which is another problem I hadn’t anticipated: What can one say to a total and complete stranger that isn’t absolutely moronic? At least on the dreaded apps, you can riff off a photo, make a joke about their name like “So how’s going through life with the name Chad?” (I never said I was good at online dating.) In the real world, I had nothing. So I just started saying “Hello” to people. I thought I was coming across like a friendly Midwesterner. People responded like I was one of those “Do you have a moment today for animal rights?” canvassers—with a confused smile, then a definite uptick in pace, as if I were about to whip out a clipboard and ask for their name and address.
One day, during afternoon grocery shopping, I spotted a good-looking guy at Trader Joe’s. I followed him around for a little bit, in what would definitely be a creepy way if the genders were reversed, and maybe is still a creepy way with the genders being what they are. I finally summoned the courage to converse in the frozen aisle when I asked him, without fully taking in the item in his hand, “Oh, have you bought that before?” He was holding frozen broccoli. He was taken aback, as one would be if a stranger asked you about your past frozen-broccoli purchases, but he answered kindly, that yes, he had. He uses frozen broccoli regularly in his omelets. “Good to know!,” I replied, before slinking away in shame.
At this point, it’s probably clear that my personality is definitely at least a large part of the problem. But I don’t think it’s just me. In addition to the plentiful awkwardness I bring to any encounter, it’s awkward that the encounter is even taking place. People aren’t used to engaging with strangers anymore, beyond a prescribed interaction (e.g., a Trader Joe’s clerk complimenting your shirt). They have earbuds in. They’re looking at their phone. They’re engaging with other people, just not the ones in the same room as them. It’s strange to interrupt that rhythm. A single, male friend of mine recently said that he’d never approach a woman sitting alone at a bar these days. Who is he to assume that she’s there to be bothered? Maybe she wants to eat alone. A simultaneous Thank you for being an ally, sir and, also, Please, men, talk to us sometimes.
To be fair, it’s not like I had absolutely no success. I took to smiling at people on the street no matter who they were, and I became actual friends with two of my neighbors that way (elderly Jewish women—my sweet spot). I sat at the sushi counter alone one night for dinner (without a book!), and while I didn’t meet any available men, I did chat with and exchange numbers with two women who were having dinner next to me, one of whom said she had a cute cousin who was soon to be separating from his wife. A 19-year-old followed me home after I smiled at him, wondering if I would ever consider going out with a younger man. (No, but still got it!) My last boyfriend, whom I dated for almost two years, was actually an old friend I had converted into something more (the rom-com dream).
I’m not sure there’s a moral to this experiment, but if there is, it’s something very unsatisfying. Something like: Finding love is hard. It’s always been hard. And it will probably always be hard, no matter where you’re trying to find it, until the day it happens, when it miraculously feels easy.
And yes, my parents met in a sickeningly cute way, at a concert full of love songs, but the part that gets left out is that my mom wasn’t sure about my dad at first, but he called so many times and eventually wore her down. If a man did that to me in this day and age, I would simply call the police. My grandfather who sent over milkshakes actually tried for months to date my grandma’s sister, and after weeks of getting denied was like, O.K., maybe I’ll try the other one. Which is, apologies to my deceased grandfather, quite gross. Sure, studies show we’re lonelier than any generation ever before, but at least I’m not dating a man who originally wanted to bang my sister. I don’t know—I think each place and time comes with its own set of challenges.
Anyway, I downloaded all the apps again. They’re, as they were before, not fun! My headphones are back on, too—I missed the Decoder Ring podcast way too much. But I still smile and say hello to people I pass on the sidewalk now. It makes me feel like part of the community. And you never know—maybe that lady’s freshly single cousin will call.
Lauren Bans is a Los Angeles–based television writer
