Talking - Not Just a Phase Anymore

There are two things that drive me crazy about the generation I’m in. One being how sensitive we can be, which leads to older generations giving us the nickname “snowflakes”. The other is our generation doesn’t “date” anymore, we “talk.” What does “talking” even mean? What is the difference between dating and talking? I’m currently living in this generation and I’m not sure I know the term “talking” means because the concept doesn’t make sense in my mind; however, I’m willing to try to talk this out for the sake of a blog post!

I’ve been dating my boyfriend now for about two months. It’s been a great two months; the honey moon phase is a real thing surprisingly. If you’ve ever been in any kind of serious relationship you know EXACTLY what I’m talking about. The one thing that irks me, though, is when people ask me how long we have been together. Well, we’ve been dating for officially for two months…but we “talked” for three months prior. Have we been together for five months total then? Yes, we’ve been together five months total, but only two months officially. Does that make any sense? I don’t think it does at all, but that’s just me.

You don’t notice our generation going on dates, but rather “hanging out” with a person of interest instead. I don’t think Aaron, my boyfriend, ever asked me on a real date prior to us officially dating. I remember the first time we hung out we got ice cream and walked around Ada for two hours; which sounds like a date, right? Getting ice cream and spending time getting to know each other felt like a date, but he never asked, “Morgan, would you like to go on a date with me?” Rather, he asked me, “do you want to hang out some time?” That interaction is what lead to our ice cream “date.”

Nowadays, Aaron will ask me things along the lines of, “do you want to get dinner tonight?” Questions like those feel more like being asked on a date, but those kinds of questions didn’t occur until we became officially “exclusive.” Notice I have been putting all the different terms there are for being with someone in quotation marks. I don’t know which terms exactly mean what or if I’m appropriately using them. Does the term “talking” mean there is no loyalty or commitment involved? Or does “talking” simply mean you are casually dating someone?

Personally, I think talking is the same as dating. I think that dating can be casual or it can be exclusive; dating someone does not necessarily mean you are exclusive with someone. Maybe that thought process makes less sense to people than the term “talking,” but in my mind, it makes much more sense. I don’t want to say chivalry is dead, because I know that is not completely true. Aaron does all sorts of nice things for me that proves chivalry isn’t dead. However, chivalry isn’t as important as it once was.