With this in mind, it's no wonder that there are so many different concepts of what courtship entails. Such variations are both cultural and individual, and stem, largely, from a difference in experience. For some of us, a date might entail something as simple as a modest meal between friends. For others a date must be extravagant, and is indicative of something more than friendship. These differences in courting culture can bring excitement, but they can also contribute confusion to the relationship. For instance, when a woman asks a man on a date, who is expected to pay for the meal? Does the man foot both bills or only his own? Is it the woman's responsibility to pay? After all, she did initiate the date.
You'll find expectations are divided, not only on this issue, but on some we might find intuitive. Differing opinions abound on such matters as whether the man should open the door for the woman, when a relationship becomes closed-off to other partners, or what intentions can be ascribed to the person who asks another out on a date. This can make dating an extremely frustrating experience. Such issues can extend beyond the first few dates and into long-term relationships. What feels like a quickly developing relationship to one partner might be a slow start to the other, and actions that constitute major relationships milestones by one framework may be non-existent in another.
It's even possible for a couple to harbor different perceptions of the level of commitment their romantic relationship has attained, where one person believes they're in a secure, long-lasting partnership and the other has no idea they think this way. This, and other situations can create needless heartache for the individuals involved. To best avoid the pain of mismatched expectations, it's important to openly communicate with your partner on the status of your relationship and your expectations and beliefs regarding it. Doing so can alleviate the misconceptions that lead to heartache.
I am particularly interested in this topic because I ascribe to a different concept of dating than most of my peers. This is best illustrated by my idea of the ideal first date. What a person strives for in a first date speaks a great deal about their dating style and objectives. For me, this is encapsulated by an experience of my uncle's.
When my uncle was a young man, he set out to improve the dating culture in his small town. A young Latter-Day Saint, he took issue with how quickly people paired off n the world around him, as our church leadership encourages putting off serious relationships until after high school, and before that time investing efforts into making good friends. He developed a plan and recruited two very good friends to assist him in it.
It began on the sixteenth birthday of a girl in their church group. My uncle phoned this young woman up and asked her on a date, for 5 pm, and said he had an appointment afterwards, so he would be bringing her back at 6 o'clock. She happily accepted, they made arrangements and my uncle hung up. A short while later, one of his friends called, and set up a date with her for 6:15, quickly followed by the third boy, who set up a date with her at 7:30. This girl agreed to be both dates, thrilled to be going out with not one, but three boys on her birthday.
My uncle pulled up to this girl's house at 5 o'clock sharp. He escorted her to the car, where she was surprised and a little chagrined to recognize the chauffeur. It was the boy she'd agreed to go out with at 7:30 that night! Her confusion lasted only until they arrived at their destination, a traffic island where they were to have a picnic. There, having set everything up and prepared to act as their waiter, was the third boy she had agreed to go out with. Her embarrassment faded as she realized what was going on.
It was a splendid time. While my uncle sat and talked to her, one of his buddies served their meal and the other played music for their entertainment. Around six o'clock, she and my uncle drove back to her place, he thanked her for the date, and she went inside. She had scarcely told her family what had happened when her second date knocked on the door and she went out again. This time, they went on a different activity, for which my uncle acted as chauffeur. He took her home, as promised, by 7:15, just in time for the third friend to take her dancing.
My uncle and his friends continued to do this for all the girls at church whenever their birthday came around, that is, until one member of the trio got married. I grew up on this tale, and it intrinsically appealed to me in that, while it fulfilled all the traditional functions of a date--it was planned, paid for, and paired off--it lacked the awkwardness that saturates the dating field as a result of undefined expectations. This date was clearly about getting to know each other, with no extra commitments or agendas--as was made obvious by the two other boys present who also had dates planned with this girl. They weren't expecting to get a good night's kiss out of her, or to be her boyfriend. These boys were collaborating to make a young woman's night delightful instead of competing for her attention and affection.
This date became my paradigm of casual dating. Like my uncle, I sought to make my high-school dates as casual and non-committal as possible. Now, when I know someone well enough to consider them a marital possibility, things are different, but on a first date, I'm usually focused on developing a friendship, not a long-term romantic relationship. In the small town I grew up in, it was easy to embrace these ideas. While not everyone's courtship style was the same, I was surrounded by friends of faith, many of whom who strove to meet similar standards to my own. Thus, my peculiar attitude towards dating went unnoticed throughout my high school years.
Needless to say, I had a rude awakening when I got to college. I distinctly remember when I first came to realize how different my expectations were from others. I had asked a friend to the dance and she seemed happy to go. I had danced with this friend for the first four dances of the evening and had a great time, and then she said she was getting tired. I saw her comfortably settled with some company from our dance class, and then immediately asked another friend--her roommate--to dance.
Shocking as this is to some audiences, where I come from, this would be the customary thing to do while your date rested. Best as I can tell, it's a way of helping more single girls dance throughout the evening, as there are sometimes too few young men to accomplish the job. However, my date and her roommate were not impressed. Every word of the tongue-lashing I received from this roommate is permanently etched on my mind. What was I doing? I was on a date, and not with her. Didn't I know better? To be frank, I didn't. In my culture, back home, the first and the last dance belong to your date, along with several in between, but no one is expected only dance with the person they went out with, or even to check with their date before dancing with another friend.
I apologized profusely to my date and her roommate, and lived for several months terrified I had accidentally offended every girl I had ever asked out. Finally, I checked with some female friends from home who assured me that, from their perspective, what I had done was normal and appropriate. In addition to the societal expectations of a date, my individual dating culture, fostered among friends, was about friendship. When among friends, jealousy or exclusive dating doesn't makes sense, and I expected others to think the same way I did. My problem wasn't maliciousness or insensitivity, simply that I didn't know the dating culture in Idaho and so made a dreadful faux pas.
I no longer ask a girl to a dance without learning what kind of behavior she expects from her dance partner. Beyond being mindful about what is expected at a dance, I also became more conscious to the many other regards in which dating cultures and expectations differ from individual to individual. I realized that people who I thought to in almost every other way might still have wildly different courtship patterns, and that it can be helpful to recognize this before pursuing a relationship with someone, or even asking them out. In my culture, it's a given that the guy pays for the activity unless the couple explicitly make other arrangements. I've been surprised to find that's not true for everyone. For me, a date is an expression of friendship and of interest in getting to know someone better. My date, however, might view it as the start of a lasting relationship. Alarmingly, some people view dates as a physical commitment as well, and expect or even feel entitled to a good night kiss at the date's conclusion. Or more.
For these reasons, to avoid discomfort or ambiguity, it's important to determine exactly what a date entails for the other party before going out with them. If that's not readily apparent, one might need to go so far as define it. Doing so, I attest, will prevent a great deal of confusion.
Concepts of dating and courtship vary as much as any other component of culture. Personally, I'm partial to the one I grew up with, and have plenty of data to back up my claims. Regardless of what meaning we ascribe to, however, it's important as we ask others out and further develop our relationships to understand that partners might view their relationships from different contexts. If not, you may one day be surprised by how differently you viewed events, and how such differences tried or even ruined your relationship.
Photo Credit Krishna Varshney on Unsplash
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