Taking people out....

So, I'm not too informed on how other people handle this, but I feel like in a relationship, there have to be two kinds of occasions to meet the other person. On the one hand, it's the nights in with a movie or some board game (can't you just feel my youthful spirit) where you just talk and make out and stuff and eat pizza on the floor. Those nights are pretty great, don't get me wrong. In fact, I went out all day yesterday with my oldest friend and her crowd and by the end of the day I was really wishing I'd been having one of those pizza nights instead of standing around all day in flat shoes and still getting back pain from it.

However, the other kind of thing is as important as those: Real dates. As in "taking someone out for it".  Obviously, you have to think these ones through a bit more, and I find that especially hard (I like to be the one who gets taken out rather than the taker), but I've come up with some ideas to make it easier, so here we go:

Make sure that transportation is taken care of. There's nothing worse than having to figure out logistics for what's supposed to be a romantic adventure, so don't even suggest me taking the train to meet you somewhere. I'm a big defender of the old value of a man picking up a girl in his car. If you don't have one, or can only break out your family's old station wagon, don't give up: Just rent one! There's a peer-to-peer car rental company called Turo that allows you to choose from lots of different types of cars (even race cars, if you like it fast) without having to deal with a big rental company. I looked up available cars in New York just now, and even for little money you can get some pretty cool rides, no matter if you just want something to flash your date with when showing up at her doorstep or if you plan on making the car the attraction and head off to a week-long road trip. Check out their website!

Choose a place that feels like a date. I'm talking restaurants with dimmed lights and discreet waiters who appear by your side with a ghostly swoosh; jazz cafés with low chairs and a twenties-feel to them where it's not weird to start dancing tightly intertwined; old-school movie theatres with plushy seats, cocktail service and classic Hollywood flicks on the program. Not your local steak house with an all-you-can-eat salad buffet and screaming kids in the next booth. Give me something to dress up for, won't you?

Or choose a place that you feel your date would like. Obviously you can screw all of the above if you know that your special company would die for the Mac n Cheese at the Red Lobster (I've never been there, thinking about it, but who knows) but no one ever goes with her 'cause her friends hate seafood (whatever). Or if she is a Disney freak who'll gladly be joined by a mob of middle school girls on their class trip to the newest installment of Frozen (will there be installments? I should do my research more thoroughly). Anything that makes someone happy will make for a good date, so it doesn't need to be featured in the ten pm newsflash to go well.

Don't give anything away. I am so into being taken out, my vision of a perfect plan is a plain "Be ready at seven" eg. the fact that I don't have to plan a thing. Call me unfeminist, but I have no problem at all with not knowing how it's about to go down - I trust him with knowing enough about my idea of fun to not make me jump off a building or something else that will ruin my hair. Also, it's so much more like a sweep-me-off-my-feet movie scene where the hero just grabs the heroine's hand and shows her the beauty of the city/the fun of being a streetcat (AristoCats is the joy of my existence)/basically a good time.

Have fun, too. I am aware that I mostly talk about the took-outs part of the deal, but you see: A date is, essentially, simply something to do while you're spending time with someone you like, and who wants to spend time with a cranky human who doesn't like what you're doing at all? Right, so the point is that whatever you're doing, both of you should enjoy. Mood is everything, ain't it so?

Love,

Rosy Smith