Humor will not be tolerated!! -Portia

I'm an 18 year old college student who has never had a boyfriend. I feel sometimes like I'm destined to be alone.

I'm a nearly-22-year-old college student who has never so much as gone on a second date with the same guy. These things happen, actually. It's not worth getting upset over, though sometimes it's hard to not feel a little down about it.

It's funny to me how often a question almost exactly like this comes up on the Board. Every few weeks, it seems sometimes. 'Tis a sad thing that we think there's something wrong with us if we don't have a boyfriend our first semester of college.

Sheesh, tonight I'm going on the first date I've had in two years. I certainly haven't lost hope yet.

I would totally date all of you. At the same time. Except that you're all at least 4 years older than me. But you're all fun, and I would so date each and every one of you. Tallest to shortest.

Giovanni Schwartz wrote:I would totally date all of you. At the same time. Except that you're all at least 4 years older than me. But you're all fun, and I would so date each and every one of you. Tallest to shortest.

Ah, I'm not so old as all that. You're just put off because I have a diploma. You're almost (or already) 19, I'm almost 22, that's 3 years. Next time say we're all at least 2 years older than you. That covers all your bases.

Unit, I'm so excited! I hope it goes well. I love dates.

Giovanni Schwartz wrote:I would totally date all of you. At the same time. Except that you're all at least 4 years older than me. But you're all fun, and I would so date each and every one of you. Tallest to shortest.

Sorry Gio, but I'm taken. And probably the shortest one here. But thanks anyway.

yellow m&m wrote:

Giovanni Schwartz wrote:I would totally date all of you. At the same time. Except that you're all at least 4 years older than me. But you're all fun, and I would so date each and every one of you. Tallest to shortest.

Sorry Gio, but I'm taken. And probably the shortest one here. But thanks anyway.

Dang. I missed my chance with "The Cute One". Haha. Not that I'm biased against short people; I'm just rather tall myself, so I feel as though I should date tall people.

Question for you all (that could probably be posted in random chatter): What cultural norms do you feel as if you are expected to follow that you don't always agree with?

Giovanni Schwartz wrote:

yellow m&m wrote:

Giovanni Schwartz wrote:I would totally date all of you. At the same time. Except that you're all at least 4 years older than me. But you're all fun, and I would so date each and every one of you. Tallest to shortest.

Sorry Gio, but I'm taken. And probably the shortest one here. But thanks anyway.

Dang. I missed my chance with "The Cute One". Haha. Not that I'm biased against short people; I'm just rather tall myself, so I feel as though I should date tall people.

Question for you all (that could probably be posted in random chatter): What cultural norms do you feel as if you are expected to follow that you don't always agree with?

Oddly enough, I'm 5' 1" and my boyfriends 6' 4". And it works.

Giovanni Schwartz wrote:Question for you all (that could probably be posted in random chatter): What cultural norms do you feel as if you are expected to follow that you don't always agree with?

I'll leave this here because it does, kinda, relate to the topic, and I'm too lazy to be all strict.

Anyway, my trouble is more with trying to avoid stereotypes. Best example I can think of right now: I have an Etsy shop. TAMN from Seriously, So Blessed! has an Etsy shop. This makes having an Etsy shop a stereotypical Mormon thing to do, so I feel guilty about having this shop. Never mind that I've earned almost a hundred dollars from it this month; I still feel guilty for falling into the stereotype (even if it is for Mormon newlywed women and not just Mormons in general).

Bob, I have a shop on etsy, if that makes you feel any better. I haven't actually tried to sell anything yet because I can't verify my paypal account because something weird always happens when I try to. And I haven't tried to fix that yet. But someday, I will actually sell stuff in my etsy shop!

I think the biggest cultural norm I don't follow is eating when other people are eating, like when I'm in a restaurant. I frequently go out to eat with people and don't eat and it freaks people out. But I can't eat gluten (and also dairy, but that's only temporary), and sometimes people want to go out for pizza or to the breakfast place that mostly has crepes and waffles or for Chinese food (soy sauce has wheat in it), and so I'll just get some juice and sit and drink my juice while people are eating. The only other option is being anti-social all the time, which is no fun. On Fridays all the grad students here go to the nasty horrible cafeteria for lunch and eat deep fried mystery meat and I just drink water. Then I go home for lunch later. Seriously, the cafeteria is nasty. They serve chicken omelettes with gravy. But it took people a long time to get used to the fact that I wasn't going to eat the cafeteria food.

I think the reason it makes people so uncomfortable is that so many people have some kind of weird guilt associated with eating and they feel like anyone not eating what they're eating must be judging them. I have a friend who also sometimes doesn't eat at when he goes out with people because he's a pretty serious runner and he's very careful about what he puts in his body. One time that friend and I went to the breakfast waffle place with a third friend (because she was dying to go there), and we both drank orange juice while she ordered her nutella-stuffed crepe, and she really couldn't handle us not getting any food. But I didn't want scrambled eggs, which was the only thing I could have gotten, and he didn't want anything greasy because he was doing a half-marathon the next day. She wouldn't even finish her crepe and I think she just got a box and took it home. We were fine with just drinking our juice while she ate her thing, but she couldn't handle it.

Oh, I had some eating-in-company issues too! People do get really uncomfortable when you don't eat with them. Or even when I would go to a birthday party and have some fruit and that's it (when I was avoiding both wheat and sugar).

This cultural norm is kind of breaking down (maybe...), but it always bugged me that everyone is so afraid of being awkward, and thinks they're so awkward, and is afraid to do things that aren't..."normal".

I'm glad that I was able to learn that everyone is awkward. I do kind of still get bugged by people doing things that are "out of the ordinary" and thinking they're really cool...and posting them to MLIA. They're not that special. But as long as they're starting to embrace that it's okay to do wacky things I can't hate them toooooooo much.

I dated someone 3 whole months younger than me once. Before then (this was 3 years ago...), I never thought I'd do that (despite various sundry crushes ~1 year under my age). Now that I'm old and gray I am not opposed to dating someone younger than me anymore. My cut off right now is return missionary (which, granted, is a margin of about a year at the moment), just so I don't have to send off any more missionaries. I've had enough of that.

Hmm, what else. If there were a cultural norm for not using parentheses I would break that every time.

Oh, and Gio, I feel like I should support you in wanting to date tall people, if only because tall girls feel so weird dating a guy shorter than they are. Which cultural norm I think spurred your question.

C is for wrote:This cultural norm is kind of breaking down (maybe...), but it always bugged me that everyone is so afraid of being awkward, and thinks they're so awkward, and is afraid to do things that aren't..."normal".

I'm glad that I was able to learn that everyone is awkward. I do kind of still get bugged by people doing things that are "out of the ordinary" and thinking they're really cool...and posting them to MLIA. They're not that special. But as long as they're starting to embrace that it's okay to do wacky things I can't hate them toooooooo much.

I dated someone 3 whole months younger than me once. Before then (this was 3 years ago...), I never thought I'd do that (despite various sundry crushes ~1 year under my age). Now that I'm old and gray I am not opposed to dating someone younger than me anymore. My cut off right now is return missionary (which, granted, is a margin of about a year at the moment), just so I don't have to send off any more missionaries. I've had enough of that.

Hmm, what else. If there were a cultural norm for not using parentheses I would break that every time.

Oh, and Gio, I feel like I should support you in wanting to date tall people, if only because tall girls feel so weird dating a guy shorter than they are. Which cultural norm I think spurred your question.

Definitely it did.

Not to say that I don't like short girls. I think that (usually) they're cute.

Just find a girl and marry her. Easy enough, even I can do it.

I'd prefer to not find a girl and marry her, if it's all the same to you.

bobtheenchantedone wrote:I'd prefer to not find a girl and marry her, if it's all the same to you.

Well then allow yourself to be found. Bam, problem solved.

Heh. It's easy to say that when you're no longer in the single camp, bismark . . . how old are you, again?
Also, some of us are putting decent effort into allowing ourselves to be found- I have no problem asking boys on dates or to dance or initiating conversation. And eventually that will pay off. Well, no, I take it back. It's paying off already because I have a lot more fun than I would if I just stood around and agonized instead of doing something about my situation. And it means I can spend my hard-earned salary on things besides a mortgage and a family for now- anyone want to go to Brazil this fall?

It is true though, if Bismark can do it, there's hope for anyone.

No, just kidding, that's mean. I'm sure you're a great guy.

Wisteria wrote:...anyone want to go to Brazil this fall?

Can't... I'm going to Taiwan.

[quote="Marduk, whose name makes me think to myself "QUACK" every.single.time"]It is true though, if Bismark can do it, there's hope for anyone.

No, just kidding, that's mean. I'm sure you're a great guy.[/quote]

But really.

I don't have a problem dating shorter guys.

One social norm I do have a problem with: I eat after I'm full?