Scheduling a Date During a Global Pandemic

Don't do this.

I've been home a lot this week (because of the global pandemic), which meant I had plenty of excess anxiety and spare brain cycles. I spent those excess cycles tapping the little heart icon on Hinge profiles while vaguely paying attention to a Netflix show. Apparently I was not alone.

I was anxious. So I broke the rules to break up the monotony. I went on a date Friday night with a new person. 

Scheduling was complicated because both our plans were in constant flux. We, and everyone else, were in the middle of rearranging our lives for this new pandemic reality. Cocktails in “East Williamsburg” were hastily arranged.

In retrospect, it hadn't sunk it how serious the situation was. If scheduling a date involves the phrase: “haha, I’d be down for a quarantine drink tonight actually!” maybe just don’t. The date itself started with an elbow bump hello and ended with an awkward don’t-get-close-enough-to-breathe-your-viruses-on-me hug goodbye. It was nice, but I wouldn’t do it again (because of the global pandemic). Learn from my example. 

Other would-be daters seem to be rapidly coming to the same conclusion. By Saturday, my online flirting had done a 180. A woman I was supposed to get drinks with messaged me: “How are you coping? Maybe we should have a drink over FaceTime? Haha” Maybe not the most exciting, but at least we'd be seeing a new face instead of just replying to group texts in our apartments. We can date like we work, in endless Zoom meetings.

I think we might be stuck in this kind of dating world for a while. (Because of the global pandemic.) If that is the case, I think I find this potential date invite I recently received the most romantic. “We could go for a walk and I don’t know stay 6 feet apart," she wrote, "just to be sure.”