Problem: I'm going to start off pretty blunt. I don't do dinner dates. Yes, I am a millennial, so to most who know anything about the psychology of my generation, people aren't surprised by this statement. Dates sort of seem fictional to me. It's sad, but it's true. For some reason, it is a stigma in my generation that people do not date anymore. Everything is so casual; people aren't getting married, and when they do, it's much later in life with different terms and intentions. However, I'm more traditional than that. I've always been told I'm ahead of my years, but in the dating world, I feel ancient. It isn't the dating part I have a problem with. I think dates are important, they bring people together, allow us to communicate at a deeper level than the surface, and they're fun! It's the dinner part that I struggle to commit to.
Reasoning: My time is valuable. No more so than anyone else's, but I'd just like to put that out there. I'm a college girl who is either working, learning, partying, studying or doing absolutely nothing. Pure value, right? It is so easy for anyone to set aside a quick hour period in the day to have dinner with someone. You can easily come up with a time conflict either before or after the dinner date to keep it short, sweet, and pretty much irrelevant because it's right in the middle of your plans. Here's an example of a real text exchange that I've had regarding a dinner date with some guy who may even be reading this.
Like that sucks. Looking back at this, it's pretty clear that on a scale of 1 to important, this was one of my last priorities of the day, and I feel terrible about that. As I stated earlier, I believe everyone else's time is as valuable as mine, and this just doesn't exemplify that. It's a pretty damn insincere plan if you ask me. No one wants to be squeezed in. At that point, what's the point?
The solution: Breakfast. Breakfast dates are so underrated, and I'm here to make a case for them. Dinner has a connotation of being this serious meal with serious intentions and forced conversation. It's sad, but true. Some people, especially in my generation, avoid dates altogether. Breakfast, however, is the meal of possibility. Breakfast food is happy food—there's a reason eggs and bacon look like smiley faces on a plate. You have a whole day ahead of you when you go to breakfast with someone. If the person isn't your cup of tea, you can simply go about your day afterward and forget all about it. However, if the person ends up being awesome, you have an entire day to plan ahead with them. In any scenario, breakfast dates force you to talk about real things, not just falling into a monolog about "how your day was," since it hasn't even happened yet.
Next time you decide you want to impress someone, get to know someone, or you just simply wake up hungry and you're bored, give the ole' breakfast date a try. You never know, your breakfast date may turn into dinner one day.
