April 12, 2007
Hanging Out?
A couple of
nights ago I was hanging out with some friends at my usual spot.
We started chatting about relationships and definitions and for the life of us we just could not agree on what constituted hanging out, dating and seeing each other. What exactly was hanging out? Was dating just hanging out but on a one-on-one basis? If you were dating, did that mean that it was casual and you could see (or hang out with) other people at the same time? If you were seeing each other, did that mean you were exclusive? And if you brought your friend home to meet your mom, would he/she then think that you guys were in a relationship with a capital "R"? (QOTD: "Die lah, now you must marry her.")
And then of course there's the whole issue of sleeping together. When sex gets thrown into the equation definitions just get a whole lot more complicated. (Aside: the worst possible time to ask the question "Are we serious or is this just for sex?" is when you're doing the nasty.)
It was a conversation that could very well have been amongst 20-somethings. And yet, the average age at that table that night was... lemme see... 34, if my math is right. You would have thought we should know better, what with experience and all but it seems like as we get older, relationships just get more complicated. Things were so much easier back in the day, like in JC where you were either dating or you weren't. Holding hands? Kissing? Going on one-on-one dates? Congrats! You're in a relationship, you're part of a couple.
I think it's the term "hanging out" that complicates everything. It gives people an out. How many times have you heard something like "Oh, we're not dating, we just hang out together a lot" or words to that effect?
Nowadays, the line is so blurred, it's a smudge. A smear. And yet, definition is everything. Well, to me at least. Definition means that you know your boundaries and you don't assume anything more or less. It just makes things so much clearer and you don't end up misunderstanding intentions.
Or maybe, the lack of definition is just symptomatic of how commitment-phobic we've all become.
Posted by scrabbyfoo at April 12, 2007 12:09 PM