I call the folks who met their partners before The Apps “Smug Marrieds.” They’re great people, and they mean well, but they just can’t help but to be a little too precious about understanding modern dating. They say things like, “I can’t IMAGINE being on the apps! What’s that like?” or “Just be patient — your person is out there!”
Bless their hearts, they just can’t help themselves. I know because EYE used to be a Smug Married.
After eight years of marriage, I got divorced in 2020. I entered the dating scene as a newly out queer divorcée creating a new life for myself. And because the universe loves to give its toughest battles to its strongest soldiers, this all happened within the first few months of the pandemic. So when I was ready to mingle but couldn’t go outside, I joined The Apps.
The last time I was single, I thought I was into men and Steve Jobs had just introduced the iPhone.1 In 2020, I had to update my dating operating system AND change its settings to “women” and “nonbinary folks” all while going through a second adolescence.
It’s been five years of misadventures in dating. I’ve learned a lot about myself, my queerness and the type of person I’d like to allow into my life. But I’d be lying if I said it’s been easy. BAYBEE. Dating in the age of apps is not for the weak. The pandemic CHANGED PEOPLE. We forgot how to people and still haven’t fully recovered. People know therapy terms but don’t go to therapy. And then there are the people who go to therapy but don’t do therapy. And the ones who do therapy? They’re in their homes under a fleece blanket complaining to Smug Marrieds and fellow singles about the bleak landscape of finding love.2
Fortunately, when dating fails me, pop culture has my back. I’ve found myself turning to shows and movies to watch some of my favorite characters make the same mistakes that I have3 and keep living, laughing and loving (themselves, because if you can’t love yourself, how the hell you gonna love somebody else4). Here are some of my favorites when I’m in a dating rut and I want to enjoy someone else’s single life:
I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again — I love this show. At the beginning, it fell victim to a marketing department that decided to focus on star Zooey Deschanel’s “adorkability,” and a lot of people counted New Girl out before it even began. But the multi-cam sitcom was more than a vehicle for Deschanel; New Girl’s ensemble cast captured the ennui of being a thirty-something in a post-Great Recession world. Dating was always front and center during the show’s seven-season run, especially the “will they, won’t they, should they” between Jess (Deschanel) and Nick (Jake Johnson). But there were lots of great storylines about modern love, including the episode when Schmidt (Max Greenfield) coaches Jess on how to use the Tinder-like app “Dice” and the post-Super Bowl gem when Nick tells Jess he loves her and Prince (the actual, late great recording artist Prince) helps them realize that they are, indeed, in love with one another.
My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997)
Spoiler alert: The main character, Julianne (Julia Roberts), doesn’t get her man, AND she makes a fool out of herself in the process. But this movie reminds me that happy endings don’t necessarily mean you end up in a relationship with the person you long for. This movie has one of my favorite last lines that gives me a little bit of hope: “Maybe there won't be marriage... maybe there won't be sex... but, by God, there'll be dancing.”
Why Won’t You Date Me? podcast
Since you can watch episodes of actress/comedian Nicole Byer’s podcast on YouTube, I’m going to include this gem on my list. This interview podcast began as a quest in which Byer tried to figure out why she was “so single,” but it’s since evolved into a show about dating and relationships.5 The guests, who range from burlesque performers to comedians to Monica Lewinsky, are surprisingly earnest when they recount their own dating misadventures. Celebs — they’re just like us!
*deep sighs*
For the sake of this post, let’s not even get into the reboot, And Just Like That (2021), nor its abysmal series finale.6 In fact, let’s go ahead and forget AJLT and the SATC movies. There’s a reason why fans and HBO have invested more than 25 years in the lives of the four central characters. The show gave us a look at four unapologetically sexually active professional women in New York City looking for their forever partners — or a least a decent orgasm. The third season is my personal favorite as we watch three of the women navigate new relationships: Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) begins dating Aidan (John Corbett)7 with Big (Chris Noth) lurking way too close; Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) and Steve move in together; Charlotte (Kristin Davis) marries Trey (Kyle MacLachlan); Samantha (Kim Cattrall) continues to have amazing sex with hot guys, including a Staten Island firefighter. What a time!
Like I wasn’t going to include my favorite show on this list. For the uninitiated, this sitcom focuses on the lives of four older women, all single or widowed, living together in Miami. The show still feels progressive 40 years later because it centers women in their 60s (and one in her 80s) embracing dating and sex. Blanche (Rue McClanahan) is known for being the most promiscuous, but Dorothy (Bea Arthur), Rose (Betty White) and Sophia (Estelle Getty) are getting it in, too. Check out the episode when Blanche unsuccessfully helps Rose and Sophia deal with the men in their lives.
Shameless plug time:
Picture it. Washington, D.C., 2007. I was a plucky summer intern at the Washington Post waiting for the metro to take me home. Suddenly, a man runs by me toward the exit of the station. A woman in a skirt and Birkenstocks is right at his heels. A couple of minutes later, a cop is leading the man away in handcuffs, and the woman is walking alongside them with the item the man had grabbed from her — an original iPhone. And THAT was the most dangerous thing that I witnessed in the big city. /scene
Me. I’m the person who does therapy.
Or worse!
Can I get an amen?
Or whatever else the guest and Byer get into. Lemme tell you, they hip hop and bounce from topic to topic, which just tickles my ADHD brain. The episode with Bob the Drag Queen is an extreme example of the chaos (complimentary!).
DON’T EVEN GET ME STARTED
I remember when I used to like Aidan… *stares wistfully in the distance*
My Best Friend‘s Wedding is the ultimate feel-good movie in times like these. The singing scene. When they go running through the city. Classic! Sending you lots of love, my friend.