Sex and the (Small) City
Settling is is an an STI STI Settling
WORDS BY emelia haskey
I don’t do new year’s resolutions for the same reason I don’t ever delete my online dating profiles entirely – sheer lack of willpower. Last year wasn’t a highlight for anyone, so a fresh start and preferably an end to the global pandemic would be a real palette cleanser. But if it’s been a rocky year for you already, don’t fear. I woke up on New Year’s Day in a tent wearing a prairie dress looking like a dishevelled Helen Reddy. Life could be worse.
2020
However, if we are going to make a commitment to anything this year it should be to ourselves. No, I am not advocating you start buying into the self-care industry and start indulging in morning yoga classes and using the word “wellness” unironically. I mean commit to putting yourself first in the one sphere we seem to all put ourself last in: dating. We’ve all made a trip to the local free checkup clinic which, for some reason always looks like an abandoned building in a zombie apocalypse film (complete with slow moving bodies making no eye contact). If you were lucky enough to experience the joys of a high school sex-ed class, you know how to put a condom on a banana and the best way to avoid catching something nasty. We know about most STIs. But we seem to forget about the most contagious disease of all – settling. It jumps quickly from person to person, can
be transmitted through very boring intercourse, unnecessary second dates, and without treatment can be fatal to your love life. Sometimes, I can’t help but think that a long relationship must be a healthy one, or that if my next date doesn’t work out that I should go full Sound of Music and join a nunnery (Captain Von Trapp is not coming for me as he’s 91 and recently deceased). Being single is regularly very depressing, especially if everyone else seems to be enjoying romantic bliss. The temptation to keep going out with someone who you only tolerate out of fear of being alone is much greater than it first appears. It’s complicated. Even if it seems like someone isn’t what we want, something is better than nothing, right? It got me wondering…why are we settling for less rather than waiting for more? Not all cases of settling are obvious. I desperately adored Mr Big when we first started going out with all the blind love of teenage romance. He was absolutely perfect in every way, so gorgeous, so brooding and temperamental. It was all very Shakespearian. My lovestruck brain brushed over how he never took me on dates, wouldn’t meet my friends, and had a growing collection of empty bottles on his wardrobe. But Hamlet is not a great boyfriend, and
