Pandemic dating often feels like a period drama courtship

In our Love App-tually series, Mashable shines a light into the foggy world of online dating.

Pandemic dating is still hell, but my lifelong affection for period piece romances has at least prepared me to yearn.

At this point the United States is coming up on a year of bumbling through the COVID-19 pandemic, and our need for basic human connection has only gotten stronger as time has worn on. When it comes to having sex, preaching abstinence, whether to a classroom of horny teenagers or an entire country going through a devastating pandemic, simply does not work. 

There are, of course, ways to safely pursue love (and then get railed) while still mitigating the risk of spreading the coronavirus. Some health officials have put out their own guidelines to COVID-safe sex — New York City infamously suggested wearing masks and using glory holes — but I have turned to the lessons of historical romance to guide me through. 

In the midst of this pandemic, talking to potential love interests for weeks on end without meeting, let alone hooking up, has felt very much like a drawn-out Victorian courtship. 

My formative years were shaped by the confines of a deeply religious upbringing that frowned upon any expression of sexuality, so yearning feels like second nature to me. Not allowed to actually experience, much less pursue, romance, I immersed myself in consuming media about romance. I spent my adolescence obsessed with it, pining less for a specific person than for the seemingly magical connection I’d seen on screen. 

I had a special affinity for period romances — anything with elaborate costumes was enough to make me swoon. As both a reader and writer of fanfiction, I had familiarized myself with romance tropes years before I ever experienced any shred of romance myself, from enemies to lovers to friends stuck together to the classic fake relationship that ends up sparking something real. 

Much like the yearning of my adolescence, it’s less for a specific human being than literally any human being.

The yearning took a backseat when I went to college and had the independence to actually experience relationships, whether serious romances or casual one night stands. Real world dating, as I learned, rarely involves a Pride and Prejudice-like pursuit. But the last year or so marks the longest I’ve been single in my adult life, and consequently, the most I’ve yearned for another human being in my adult life. Much like the yearning of my adolescence, it’s less for a specific human being than literally any human being. 

Although some parts of the United States are in better shape than others, most health officials advise against gathering with people outside your household. With limited opportunity to safely meet up for dates, I’ve spent the last year reacquainting myself with my first love: period piece romances. 

During the first few weeks of the pandemic when wearing loungewear every day was still a novelty and not a given, I started Outlander, a steamy series about accidentally time traveling to 18th-century Scotland. I have watched the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice too many times to count, and its 2016 sword-wielding parody Pride and Prejudice and Zombies with alarming frequency. When Netflix dropped Bridgerton this winter, I devoured it in a few days. 

Bridgerton follows Simon, an aloof duke determined to maintain his bachelor status, and Daphne, a naive debutante determined to marry by the end of high society’s season, as they fake a courtship and (spoiler alert!) inevitably fall in love. The show gained popularity for its stunning costumes and steamy sex scenes that paired softcore porn with string quartet covers of modern pop songs. 

It would be irresponsible to highlight Bridgerton without also mentioning its odd dismissal of racial politics and its inclusion of a highly controversial rape scene. Despite the show’s problematic aspects, I burned through the show so quickly because its premise felt like an anachronistic reflection of my experience dating during the pandemic.

Like the romanticized courtship rituals of the Regency Era in which Bridgerton takes place, pandemic dating comes with its own set of rules. All of my early dates have taken place outdoors in public, and because of masks, are inherently chaste. You can have however many matches and suitors as your want, but any level of physical intimacy comes with the expectation of exclusivity. Nobody has asked for my hand in marriage, but being in my twenties and used to casual flings born from apps and dance floors, asking my immediate household for permission to bring someone over feels pretty close. 

The slow burn does put a damper on the more exciting parts of dating, but it’s a worthy trade for safety. Michele Shocked, a drag performer based in Ojai, met their partner on Grindr, which is notorious for users seeking casual sex over long term relationships. They texted in paragraphs for weeks before discussing anything vaguely sexual, which Michele Shocked noted was rare for Grindr matches, and despite the intimacy of their conversations and meeting up for socially distanced dates, have yet to actually touch. 

“It feels Pride and Prejudice-y because it’s been very regimented, each interaction and escalation in feeling has had special attention paid to it”

“It feels Pride and Prejudice-y because it’s been very regimented, each interaction and escalation in feeling has had special attention paid to it,” they told Mashable through Twitter DM. “It has been missing that white hot insatiable feeling some people associate with romance but there is so much non-verbal communication that feels quintessential to romance nowadays that we don’t have access to in most capabilities.” 

That’s not to say that COVID-safe dating shouldn’t be sex-positive. My love life over the past year has ironically mirrored my strict Christian upbringing, though the absence of casual sex is less rooted in shame and more in trying not to end up in an ICU bed. The sex I have had during the pandemic, even if it wasn’t with some Mr. Darcy-type soulmate, has still required some emotional investment because of how high the stakes are. 

Before embarking on anything under the mask, both parties place an immense amount of trust in each other to not be infected. No matter how casual a relationship may be, there’s an implicit commitment and care for the other that I haven’t experienced in pre-COVID flings that weren’t serious enough to label. The callous nature of casual hookups doesn’t work when you’re sleeping with someone vulnerable enough to not only be emotionally invested, but also put their physical health at risk. 

For some couples whose love story began during the pandemic, it involves going all in before even being able to explore the relationship in person. Neil, an English professor, met Molly through a “playful exchange” on Twitter in last October and they’ve been talking constantly since. (They preferred to only be quoted using their first names out of privacy concerns.) Neil lives in Canada, and Molly lives in the United States. With travel restrictions in place for the foreseeable future, the couple has yet to spend time together in person, and likely won’t be able to for months. That hasn’t stopped them from pursuing a serious relationship, which Neil does admit sounds “crazy.” 

“I’m not nervous that we won’t have chemistry. It’s possible, I guess? But there are so many things that I’m looking forward to and they far outweigh the things that might make me nervous.”

“I’m not nervous that we won’t have chemistry. It’s possible, I guess? But there are so many things that I’m looking forward to and they far outweigh the things that might make me nervous,” Neil explained via Twitter DM. “We agreed pretty early on that we wouldn’t waste one another’s time, that if we’re going to explore this, it would be serious and one of us would have to [be] willing to move,” Neil explained via Twitter DM. 

A pandemic courtship skips the steps that modern dating tends to wallow in, and dives headfirst into the ones that involve difficult conversations. When sex comes with the risk of spreading COVID, potential lovers can trap each other in an eternal talking stage without meeting, the purgatory between expressing interest and putting a label on it. 

The second option is to be direct about exclusivity before even taking off the mask, but that also requires charging forth with some level of trust in each other. You can bypass this entirely by hooking up within your lockdown circle, like 41 percent of adults surveyed by Match.com, but I personally can attest to the fact that this situation also requires having excruciatingly honest discussion about intent and expectations. 

My colleague Rachel Thompson referred to pandemic dating as “turbo relationships” because of the intensity that COVID restrictions add to otherwise new couples. It’s a natural progression considering that both parties have to agree to be all in before actually having sex. To agree to exclusivity before even kissing is a daunting but necessary part of safe COVID-era dating. It sometimes does feel regressive to adhere to these rules, but remembering that it’s for public safety and not because of archaic societal expectations that strip women of their autonomy, helps. 

In spite of the patriarchal views that shaped old-timey courtships, the great romance novels make the wait somewhat sweeter. Erika Lee, a reporter in Boise, met her boyfriend at a wedding in Australia only a few weeks before the United States began mandating stay-at-home orders. In the last year, they’ve managed long distance with FaceTime dates, online games, and even taking weekend “trips” together by exploring destinations on Google Maps. The yearning is slightly more bearable, Lee said, when she frames it as her own personal fairy tale. 

“Those types of stories romanticized it for me. It made me feel like waiting is actually a noble act, and that makes it more worth it in the end,” Lee DM’d Mashable on Twitter. “I think without these types of narratives, like you know the ones with people writing letters to their husbands at war, or [to] their long distance lovers, it definitely would be less fairy tale-like. But the idealism is fun.” 

My reputation as a virtuous woman worthy of a land-owning husband isn’t at risk, but my lung function probably is.

It’s unlikely that I will end up in anything as extreme as an accidental marriage because of a salacious kiss, like Daphne and Simon do in Bridgerton. Still, physical contact during a pandemic, whether premeditated or in the heat of the moment, does have consequences. My reputation as a virtuous woman worthy of a land-owning husband isn’t at risk, but my lung function probably is. Until COVID is less of a threat, I’m happy to keep yearning through these courtships. 

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