Before this goes any further, I think we should establish exactly what we\u2019re doing here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you\u2019re reading this because you intend to fall in love with me, thank you for your interest. I admire your optimism. Before either of us makes a decision we\u2019ll inevitably describe to our friends as \u201ccharacter building\u201d, I\u2019d like to direct your attention to the following document because I\u2019ve reached the deeply unsettling conclusion that romance is the only significant life event conducted with absolutely no onboarding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Think about it. We receive instructions for everything else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are doors labelled \u201cPush\u201d and \u201cPull\u201d as though I might otherwise attempt a third option involving telekinesis, microwave meals warning that the contents may be hot, and every software update asking whether I\u2019ve read the Terms & Conditions when we both know nobody has. Even the printer has a troubleshooting guide, despite its preferred method of communication being silent resentment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Love, on the other hand, has somehow escaped regulation entirely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Nobody explains when eye contact becomes flirting. Nobody clarifies whether lighting someone\u2019s cigarette is an intimate gesture or just a perfectly reasonable response to watching another human being repeatedly attempt arson against themselves. Nobody tells you whether \u201cwe should do this again\u201d is a date, a farewell, or the verbal equivalent of \u201ckind regards\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The official guidance appears to be: You\u2019ll know<\/em>. And you know what, I won\u2019t. I\u2019ve accepted that now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I spent years assuming I\u2019d eventually wake up fluent in whatever language everyone else seemed to be speaking. Apparently there comes a point where you instinctively recognise chemistry, distinguish flirtation from friendliness, and understand why someone replying after eleven minutes is romantic whereas replying after eleven hours is emotionally unavailable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I appear to have slept through that lesson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For a while, I assumed technology would help. It did not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At one point I realised I was using Hinge the way everyone else was using LinkedIn. People were looking for life partners. I was recruiting participants for my psychology research on risky sexual behaviour (it was a success!). Occasionally I\u2019d remember that I was, in fact, supposed to be attracted to these people, not assessing whether they\u2019d make interesting data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In hindsight, this may explain why dating apps never really worked for me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My first crush lasted five years, despite the rather inconvenient detail that he had absolutely no idea he was participating (plus he was seeing someone else). I\u2019ve spent entire lectures convinced everyone could hear my stomach growling, only to discover it was the projector. I\u2019ve laughed at jokes I didn\u2019t hear because everyone else did, and then had to improvise an explanation when someone asked what I found so funny.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If there\u2019s one thing I\u2019ve learnt about myself, it\u2019s that I can commit to almost anything except correctly interpreting social cues. Which leaves me with a problem: nobody can tell me when a relationship officially begins. I find that, frankly, an irresponsible way to run a civilisation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, in the absence of any recognised authority on the matter, I\u2019ve taken the liberty of drafting the necessary paperwork or rather, attempting to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Unfortunately, the complete document is still under revision because I\u2019ve been editing it in my head for years. Every crush has added a sentence, every awkward interaction has produced a footnote, and every avoidable mistake has resulted in another policy update.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Until the final version is approved, however, I think we should begin with something much easier. Before we decide whether we\u2019re compatible, it would help to establish what position you\u2019re actually applying for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Are you looking for a partner, or a therapist? A parent, or a roommate with benefits? Someone to admire you, someone to fix you, someone to validate every decision you\u2019ve ever made, or someone willing to witness your life as it unfolds?<\/p>\n\n\n\n We use the word \u201crelationship\u201d as though it refers to one universally agreed-upon arrangement, when in reality two people can enter the same relationship wanting entirely different things while each assumes they\u2019re reading from the same script.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the interests of transparency, I should also disclose that if you ever intend to share a bed with me, you\u2019re going to have to shower first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I know. My mother has already informed me this is why I\u2019m single. Apparently, expecting people to wash off a day\u2019s worth of dust, sweat, pollution, public transport, and whatever else they\u2019ve collected before getting into bed is an unreasonable standard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNobody is going to marry you if you keep making them bathe before bed,\u201d she reminds me every time the subject comes up. I love that she thinks this is the deal-breaker. Not the fact that I\u2019ll eventually turn you into a case study based on the available evidence or that I voluntarily watch emotionally ruinous films because I consider catharsis a legitimate form of self-care, and certainly not the checklists I make for fun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She insists compromise is the foundation of every successful relationship. I agree, I just don\u2019t think compromise should begin with my bedsheets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The shower itself isn\u2019t really the point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The point is that everybody has some version of it. We all come with strange little operating instructions that somehow never make it into the introductory conversation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019d like to know whether \u201cI\u2019m fine\u201d means you\u2019re actually fine, or whether I\u2019ve just been enrolled in an emotional escape room with no clues. Whether you genuinely don\u2019t mind where we eat, or whether we\u2019re about to reject every restaurant within a five-kilometre radius until we accidentally end up at the one you wanted all along. Whether silence means comfort to you or punishment. Whether you disappear when life gets difficult or ask for help.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We spend so much time asking people about their favourite films, favourite bands and favourite foods, as though two people have ever built a life together because one preferred Interstellar <\/em>and the other Shrek<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The questions that actually determine whether two people can build a life together don\u2019t usually appear until much later, by which point you\u2019re already emotionally invested enough that the answers matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Which feels like a remarkable design flaw.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Imagine if airports worked like that. You\u2019d check in, board the flight, settle into your seat, taxi onto the runway, and only then would somebody wander down the aisle asking whether you happened to be afraid of flying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It feels backwards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019d like to know these things in advance because I\u2019d like to know what I\u2019m accidentally agreeing to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Unfortunately, every time I try to write the questions down, they become less useful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Take, for example, the entirely reasonable request that you tell me who you are. It sounds straightforward enough. Until I remember I\u2019ve spent twenty-two years repeatedly surprising myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are versions of me that only existed for one summer. Entire belief systems I\u2019ve now misplaced. Opinions I\u2019ve defended with embarrassing confidence that now make me wonder whether somebody else briefly borrowed my body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The girl who somehow managed to end up in the emotional collateral damage of a relationship she wasn\u2019t even part of would\u2019ve answered this questionnaire very differently from the woman writing it now. I\u2019m not entirely convinced she\u2019s gone. I think she just lives in an earlier draft. Which raises an administrative difficulty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If I no longer agree with previous versions of myself, which one exactly am I asking you to fall in love with? The current edition? Version history? Or the complete archive?<\/p>\n\n\n\n I suspect most of us never really leave any of them behind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We introduce ourselves with the highlights, the polished edition \u2013 the one that\u2019s survived several rounds of editing. We don\u2019t usually mention the deleted paragraphs, the contradictory footnotes, the chapters rewritten after somebody left, or died, or stayed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n By the time we think to mention them, they\u2019ve stopped feeling like old versions of ourselves and started feeling like the only version we\u2019ve ever known.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Perhaps that\u2019s why these Terms & Conditions have taken so long to finish. Every time I think I\u2019ve reached the final draft, I discover I\u2019ve been editing a document that\u2019s still being written. Which is deeply inconvenient.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s difficult to provide accurate onboarding materials when the software keeps updating itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cover image by Taarina Therese Chandiramani<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Are you looking for a partner, or a therapist? A parent, or a roommate with benefits?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":507,"featured_media":29692,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5547,8],"tags":[3269,5577,565,5572,2207,4544,5571,5580,5570,5578,3267,5253,5574,5569,5573,2441,5576,5575,5579],"class_list":{"0":"post-29666","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-commitment-and-sexuality","8":"category-voices","9":"tag-commitment","10":"tag-communication-in-relationships","11":"tag-dating","12":"tag-dating-and-intimacy","13":"tag-dating-apps","14":"tag-emotional-intimacy","15":"tag-falling-in-love","16":"tag-hinge","17":"tag-love-and-relationships","18":"tag-love-and-vulnerability","19":"tag-modern-love","20":"tag-queer-intimacy","21":"tag-relationship-boundaries","22":"tag-relationship-compatibility","23":"tag-relationship-expectations","24":"tag-romantic-relationships","25":"tag-self-awareness-2","26":"tag-social-cues","27":"tag-terms-and-conditions-of-love"},"menu_order":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/507"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29666"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29666\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29668,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29666\/revisions\/29668"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tarshi.net\/inplainspeak\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}