Dates are stressful things these days. None of that breezy hopping over to the favourite cafe that Archie Comics made look so easy. In the times we live in, it’s hard to tell if a date is a date. It could very well be a non-date. You know, where you’re just hanging out, with none of the baggage that comes with calling the tryst a “date”.

Last weekend. Two days. Two lunches. Two very different men. Both dates? At least I was given the choice of venue for both, which is a good thing, because there’s nothing like unfamiliar food to put one on edge. And nobody likes to be edgy on a date. Or, was it a date?

Date one. He’s good-looking. He’s wickedly funny. He orders everything on the menu, which makes me love him immediately, but also makes me fear the bill. Because in this day and age of feminism we split the bill, right? Even on a “date”? 

The D-word had not been mentioned. Not once. Because that makes things decidedly non-platonic and those are risky waters. So let’s skirt around that and promise to “break bread over lunch”. And break bread we did, copiously. No footsie. Liberal doses of flirting. Much laughter. The bill arrives. I’m a modern girl. I fight to add my not-so-tuppenny bit into the black folder that the steward has put on the table. 

“What are you doing?” he says. “It’s a date, for God’s sake.” Darn. I hadn’t even used my Date Perfume. But phew! Because that lunch would have left me hungry for the rest of the week.  

Date two. He’s cute. He’s amusing. He lets me order his dish, which is a good thing because I know my meat. I feel like this isn’t a date. No flirting. He did pick me up though. Does that count? His car music wasn’t bad — I rocked out a little. Oh, that wasn’t very girlie of me. Come to think of it, this steak isn’t very girlie of me. Ah well. Too bad. The bill arrives. My tuppenny bit is graciously accepted. Non-date, I think. 

“We should do this again,” he says. “It’s the most fun date I’ve had in a while.” Oh? I definitely wasn’t even wearing Date Shoes. 

My mother says, in her time going out for a movie with a boy meant it was definitely a date. The non-platonic kind. Too many movies meant you were going to marry him. 

We live in complicated times, it seems. Do dates even exist? And if they do, why do we never find out until after we’ve been on one?! 

How do you know it’s a date? Tell t2@abp.in