New York, I Love You, But You’re Bringing Me (And My Sex Life) Down

In the past months, I have been trying to break my longstanding European – oh, who am I kidding, French – streak by attempting to date the kind of man my mother has been tacking to her mental vision board of my life since 2005 – “a nice Jewish boy with a stable job and good family values.” (Please keep in mind that my mom isn’t Jewish – she is just that satisfied with her choice of husband.) Mom expressed concern that the world had run out of age-appropriate options in the decade I had dedicated to moody Frenchmen. I calmed her nerves by showing her Hinge, a luxury outlet overflowing with clean-cut boys with Stanford degrees, JPMorgan jobs, Machu Picchu pictures, and cute nephews. My mother would have 90-day-fiancéed me to any of them, but, alas, Hinge has to yet configure that option. (Brilliant. I know. You’re welcome.)

After years of dating Europeans, I knew the sudden switch would come with a culture shock. I truly wasn’t expecting my love life to immediately pan out like some saccharine Andrea Bocelli music video – in a way, I didn’t even want it to. And yet, nothing could have prepared me for the systematic, bland, cheap lack of romance that was waiting for me on New York City dating turf.

To start, almost none of the guys on Hinge can – or want to? – hold a conversation. Nobody makes any effort to engage – and yet, they all claim to be seeking a “confident and intelligent partner!” If they do talk to you, they either want to “continue the conversation over a drink” within 24 hours, or they evaporate within 2.4 minutes. If the constellations align and you make it to an actual date, then proceed to pass their qualification (i.e. f*ckability) test, the whole endeavor quickly morphs into a financial gamble. According to the unwritten rules of New York big-boy dating, you you invest $300 – $500 into up to 3 dates and wait for ROI (sex). If it happens, gauge performance and potentially invest more. If it doesn’t, pull out. (Note that most of these guys are seeding their investment dollars across multiple channels, i.e. dating at least two other people aside from you.)

Let me give you two examples.

1. Ethan. Ethan was a second-generation Eastern European Jew I dated back in November ’18. He read complicated books, worked for the UN, and had the IQ of my last two exes combined. He gave me sociopath vibes but I ignored them because he was perfect on paper and I liked using his brain as the BBC app. On date three, he insisted he wanted to cook me dinner. I came over to find his apartment set up like some “How to Seal the Deal” YouTube tutorial: Sinatra, pasta, roasted asparagus, pre-made tiramisu from Whole Foods, and an overly eager Ethan. He didn’t even wait to open the tiramisu container before attempting to take my clothes off, which really made me want to keep them on – which, in turn, prompted Ethan to get angry with me and call me a “child.” I told him to send me the Whole Foods bill and never call me again. (Ugh, I wish I had done that. In either case, he never called me again.)

2. Mr. Goldman Sachs. Tall and shaped a bit like a noodle, Mr. Goldman Sachs hailed from the Upper East Side, enjoyed beer pong, occasionally stimulated his brain with mushrooms and, as you may have guessed, worked for Goldman Sachs. He never texted me between dates, other than to send me pictures of “Meal Prep,” i.e. lunches that he prepared in advance for the week. After Date 3, I felt the pressure to sleep with him mounting, so I caved and invited him over to endure an imminent Polar Vortex. He answered, “Coolio, we’ll drink some Sancerre and fool around. Gonna be great.” I asked him what he meant by “fool around.” He said, “Gonna have to find out where the night takes us.” I woke up the next day and cancelled, blaming it on a life-threatening sinus infection. Mr. Goldman Sachs never even followed up to find out if I had survived.

I realize that there is nothing particularly appalling about any of this, and that nobody mistreated me or violated me in any way. All they were doing was “playing The Game,” which, in New York, is code for “trying to get laid.”

Which is fine. We are all adults and should be having sex – in fact, I wish I was having a lot more of it. And yet, by trying to win at “The Game,” many American men have lost another kind of game – if they ever had it to begin with. I am referring to that delicate game of seduction that Europeans have in abundance, the same one that has inspired many a goo-goo eyed American woman to jet across the Atlantic. News flash: European men are all trying to get laid as well, maybe even more so – they are just getting about it in a smarter way. Inste­ad of counting dates and bases, they work on bridging the intimacy gap and building trust, which then catapults everything else to happen organically. Because, contrary to what American men seem to think, we women actually really like sex – we just don’t like feeling like it is being pulled and prodded and purchased. (On the flip side, God forbid you follow your libido and sleep with somebody on Date One – in America, this kind of emancipation will have you perceived as a slut in no time!)

There are many theories on the root of this predicament. Esther Perel attributes it to the “goal-oriented” American culture, noting that, to Americans, sexuality is “something you do versus a place where you go and experience. It’s a goal with an objective and an end.” My friend Julia Reiss points out that American men are often socialized by porn, which often leads to a “perverse and inaccurate” vision of sex. “I feel like for many American boys, Pornhub is their Sex Ed, and it’s devastating their sex lives and those of their partners. European cultures have a much more open and less taboo relationship with sex, which means young men aren’t driven to the Internet for answers.” Others blame it on Puritan values or the Madonna-whore complex, which causes a fierce divide of women into potential partners and bona fide sex objects.

I still remember my first boyfriend, a jacked-up Jew from Long Island who claimed he wanted to marry me, only for me to later find out that he had a second girlfriend. When I asked why, he said, “I can’t f*ck you the way I f*ck her.” I was eighteen. This man shaped my initial understanding of sex, and it took me years to re-shift it to a healthy direction. Only after a long relationship (and a few Frenchmen) did I acknowledge that I didn’t need to play games, or hold in to my sexuality like it was a prize for the highest bidder, or give it up to anyone just to earn their approval. Only in my mid-twenties did I finally realize that romance has nothing to do with fancy dinners, and intimacy has rien à voir with how well you know the Kamasutra. A real connection, the kind that tugs at one’s psyche and makes a lasting impression, comes from us both being human – nuanced, mysterious, vulnerable, exposed, imperfect. Dating in New York occasionally makes me forget all of this.

In France, the word “dating” is often disparaged and substituted for expressions such as “avoir une histoire” (have a story) or to have a “bon moment” (have a good moment). I used to mock this, only to recently realize that I myself have crossed over to the other side. Just like it’s hard to don Forever 21 after feeling the lux touch of The Row, it is impossible to date like a human funnel after experiencing genuine intimacy. 

In this fickle, transient world, we could all use some quality over quantity. Perhaps, we should all try to build some real connections, even if it’s just for a little bit.