Venturing into the wilderness of offline dating

I permanently deleted dating apps one year ago. I didn't expect my love life to heat up soon after.

I’ve been on and off every single dating app for the past 15 years. A few months after graduating from college, I put $79.99 on a credit card to pay for a one-month subscription to Match.com, which resulted in exactly one date with a guy who—you guessed it—was weird and awkward and didn’t even live near me. My 20s and early 30s coincided with the rise of dating websites and apps, meaning that I got to experience the highs and lows of each new, improved, and progressively worse way to find a date that some rando tech bro in Silicon Valley could get venture capital funding for. I’ve been on OkCupid, eHarmony, Tinder, Hinge, Bumble, CoffeeMeetsBagel, Happn, and once, back in 2011, I even went on a date with a guy I met on Craigslist.

Deciding to delete dating apps—for good

As a 39-year-old woman with a decade-plus of dating app adventures behind her, I wish I could say that my decision to delete dating apps for good was spurred by a devastating breakup, or what I could definitively describe as “the worst date ever.” Although, as someone who willingly went on a Craigslist date, this is a high bar to meet.

Last October, after a few months on the apps with barely any matches and no flirty conversations to continue, I instinctively knew that dating apps simply didn’t work anymore. The algorithms that once helped you match with someone kinda cute in your local area were now designed to keep you swiping indefinitely, looking at an infinite scroll of singles who, like you, were bored in line at the grocery store. When I decided to do a permanent delete of the apps, I had a feeling that—unlike the hundreds of other times I’d done this—I wouldn’t come crawling back, hoping this time would be different.

My dating app deletion coincided with my cuffing season challenge, which started as a joke but forced me to “put myself out there” (ugh, I know) and flirt with five men a week for November. When my month of flirting ended, I felt like it was a failed experiment. I’d gotten a few numbers, but no actual dates or romantic prospects. The one thing I did gain from my flirt-a-thon was the knowledge that I didn’t need dating apps to meet someone, even though most of the men I met weren’t the type of guys I wanted to date anyway.

Frenching in the French Quarter

I also realized that I didn’t miss dating apps at all. It was a relief not to have to “market” myself as a dateable prospect anymore. I didn’t feel pressure to cultivate a social media persona that appealed to the opposite sex. I no longer had to capture cute photos of myself “doing cool things”, which was always a challenge because my main hobbies are reading in bed and sitting hunched over a laptop, a.k.a. being a writer.

I still felt completely pessimistic about dating and finding love, but at least now I didn’t have to try to “spark” a connection with a grown man who took a full five business days to respond to a single Hinge message. I went to New Orleans over the holidays, met a British guy at a bar the night of my birthday, and we engaged in a hot makeout in the middle of the street in the French Quarter at 2 a.m.

He ghosted me the next day, providing more proof that I was truly in my rejection era. But still, better to get wooed by a charming foreigner with a cute accent, makeout on Chartres Street after too many birthday cocktails, and never see him again than open up a dating app and find that the guy you were talking with unmatched you. If I were going to get rejected, I’d rather have it occur in dramatic fashion, not because someone simply swiped their thumb to the left.

Stranger danger—or a true meet cute?

In January, I was taking a relaxing Sunday stroll along the lake path downtown when a man approached me, telling me he liked my “beautiful red hair.” Never one to turn down a compliment, I thanked him and we got to chatting, walking and talking while the unseasonably warm weather facilitated our meet cute. I told him I was a writer and he asked if I wanted to get a coffee at a nearby bookstore. I declined but said maybe we could go another time. I gave him my number and when we bid adieu he leaned in for a hug, telling me I smelled good.

Some of my girlfriends were horrified that I gave my number to this total stranger I met on a walk. I kept trying to explain that it wasn’t creepy at all, because he was HOT. He even looked sexy in the tiny circular profile photo that shows up in your contacts if you both have an iPhone. If an ugly guy approaches you on the street and says something about your appearance, that’s sexual harassment. But when a hot guy does it, you’re allowed to call it “meant to be.”

I did wonder if this was the universe rewarding me for all that hard work I had done flirting and risking rejection a couple of months prior.

Was I starring in my own romantic comedy? I wondered. Is this really what it’s like to have what Gen Z calls “main character energy”?

A few days after our fated encounter, this guy (who I will now call M), texted me and asked me out. Compared to being on the apps, I loved how straightforward our interaction was. I felt like I was in the '90s, when setting up a date was as simple as a phone call. He picked me up in his car (stranger-danger! but really it was fine because his car was a lot nicer than mine) and we headed to a fancy cocktail lounge. After a couple of cocktails so well made you could barely taste the alcohol, M kissed me passionately outside the bar while we were walking back to his car. He drove me home and I invited him up, unable to resist his intense, sexy dark eyes and very luscious lips.

M and I went on a few more dates, but after having “the talk” about what we wanted, it was clear we weren’t on the same page. I wanted a relationship and he did not. He was also quite a bit younger than me, so it was hard to imagine things working out for us long-term. Regardless of our ridiculous sexual chemistry, I knew I would be betraying myself if I continued to hang out with M, and I told him as much. We parted ways on good terms. I was proud of myself for having this conversation after date three—not three months (*cough* two years) into a vague situationship, which had been my pattern for a long time.

The hottest summer on record (for me)

The next few months were very date-less and romance-less. I was busy not getting a job and preparing to release my debut novel. I resigned myself to yet another sweaty season of involuntary abstinence, as the warmer months had always been a dead time for me sex and love-wise. I’d always failed to conjure a summer lover or even a brief, hot hookup in the middle of July.

But then, just as Texas was about to hit 100 degrees and stay that way for five months, I got a text from M. Our casual “hey, how’ve you been” conversation quickly escalated to full-on flirting. How are you became where are you—right now. Soon after, M and I were making out on the rooftop lounge of my apartment building, the hot breeze engulfing us like a humid cocoon.

Suddenly things were heating up and it wasn’t just the weather. M and I fell into a routine of spending our Sunday evenings together. Some of these nights involved taking a dip in the rooftop pool to cool off—while topless.

Double-texting in triple-digit heat

In mid-July, I went to a brewpub by myself for dinner and struck up a conversation with the guy who worked behind the counter. Before I left, he wrote his name and number in giant letters with a Sharpie on a large piece of receipt paper.

“Gee, do you think this guy wants me to call him?” I asked my friends later that night, comically pulling out the CVS-long receipt paper from my purse, like a modern-day, sluttier Mary Poppins.

I texted Brewpub Guy the next day. We were having a very cute getting-to-know-you convo when a fresh text from M popped up on my phone. I had forgotten that it was a Sunday night—primetime for our rooftop makeouts/cooling-off sessions. Brewpub Guy¹ was also asking what I was up to that night.

Am I seriously texting two guys at the same time?! I asked myself incredulously. On a dating app, this is par for the course. But in the real world, I’d never had two men interested in me simultaneously. When it comes to dating, I’m a mono-tasker, not a multitasker.

The trick to getting hit on in public: publish a novel

Little did I know that a third prospect would enter my orbit. In the spring, I had struck up a conversation with a guy I was sitting next to at a coffee shop. I had met up with a friend to plan my book launch party and take some Instagram-worthy photos of me and my soon-to-debut novel.

The guy at the coffee shop asked me about my book, and then bought me a latte. [Reader, take this as proof that if you read Romance vs. Reality in public, a cute guy will come up and talk to you, even if you’re not the author.] I invited him to my book launch party but never heard back after I sent out the email invite.

Is it ghosting if a guy doesn’t respond to an email you sent to both him and 85 other people? I wondered.

In July, I ran into Coffee Shop Guy again. We’ll call him F. Did I mention that he was an architect? It’s a long-running joke online that being an architect is a job that only exists in romantic comedies. No cute, single guy in his 30s sitting next to you sipping an espresso is really an architect, because that’s not a real job. Women who write romance novels and rom-com movies made up “architect” as a profession because there’s something inherently sexy about men who build and design things, as long as they aren’t tiny homes.

Flirting via email—with a little help from ChatGPT

But F was real, and he really was an architect. When I ran into F a second time, he mentioned that he was planning a trip to Los Angeles. I asked what part of town he was staying in. He said he had no idea, but would find out and email me later. It turned out he would be staying in my old neighborhood while in L.A.

“I would love to hear your input and any areas of interest,” F wrote in the email. Either F had a very formal email style or was using ChatGPT to respond to me.

I wrote back with all my neighborhood recommendations, feeling nostalgic about my old L.A. life and missing the friends I’d left behind. I ended up booking a flight back to L.A. a few weeks later. I didn’t hear back from F, figuring he’d gone on his trip and forgotten all about it. But then, just as I was packing for my trip out to La La Land, an email from F appeared in my inbox. He thanked me for the recs, said his L.A. trip had been pushed back, and was flying there this week.

I wrote back and said “I'm actually flying to L.A. tonight! Funny how we'll both be there at the same time.”

“Wow Rosanna, I am very excited to hear that you are flying to L.A. tonight. It's funny and amazing how destiny works for us both to be here on the same days,” he replied, again making me wonder if he was using ChatGPT or really did talk like this.

Flying 1000 miles for a first date

I texted F and we planned to meet up in my old neighborhood. We hit up a speakeasy that’s hard to find unless you’re a local. The friends I was staying with in L.A. were married and homebodies (*cough* boring) now, so it was fun to have a non-jaded Angeleno to hit the town with. The second night F and I went out, this time to a strip of bars in Silver Lake that were already overpriced well before inflation, we engaged in a hot makeout in my rental car.

What is it about not being in your daily life (or your own car) that makes you feel more free and adventurous? I wondered during my impromptu rendezvous with F.

I did not think that the guy I met while checking my email would turn into a spicy night of passion in a city neither of us lived in. Dating apps are designed to help you meet someone in your same zip code. But a dating app can’t configure a situation where you meet someone within three miles of your apartment and don’t hook up with them until you’re 1300 miles away from the place you hang out at every day. Only the magical/random algorithms of the universe can do that.

Retired from the game

People still ask me when I’m going to “get back on the apps”. I kindly explain that I am officially retired—and not in a Tom Brady way. Looking back on my year of non-dating, I have to admit that I did date quite a bit this year. Sure, there were dry spells and times I wasn’t thinking about cute guys at all (okay, except for Paul Mescal). Released from the pressure “to date”, I was more present in my daily life. More open to connection, regardless of the outcome.

It’s hard to let go of control and leave your romantic prospects up to fate. Seven years ago, I met a man at a Starbucks who would change my life forever, both in good and bad ways. I sometimes wonder if we were fated to meet, or if it was just a chance encounter. Maybe, like F wrote in his overly formal email, it was funny, amazing, and in my case, ultimately heartbreaking, how destiny worked for us both to be there on the same day, sharing a communal table at a Starbucks in a city full of millions of people.

Is this the end of dating?

Unlike the plot of 99% of romance novels and romantic comedies (except *cough* mine), I have no idea what’s going to happen next in my dating life.

I never know what to say when people ask me the same questions I’ve been asked for 15 years: So, are you seeing anyone? What’s new in your dating life? Are you dating? Give me an update on your love life. Do you have a guy in your life right now? What happened to whatshisface? Are you single? Do you have a boyfriend? ARE YOU ON THE APPS??

At least now I can easily answer the last question. The more I think about it, the more I wish we could all stop dating. Dating is a relatively new invention in our human history. For centuries, people have met, exchanged witty barbs, spent time together, and fallen in love without partaking in any dating rituals or trying to follow terrible dating advice from books like Men Who Love Bitches or The Rules.

Giving up on dating or opting out of the ‘dating scene’ seems to be an emerging trend. I think this is because many of us are burned out on dating apps and crave genuine, authentic connection. If I’ve learned anything this year, it’s that, despite my girlfriends’ cries of WHERE ARE ALL THE GOOD MEN, finding decent people to date is not easy, but it’s not impossible. However, you have to be willing to release all expectations, open yourself up to the magical/random algorithms of the universe, and let life surprise you.

Like Carrie Bradshaw in that one episode of Sex and the City where she takes a handful of women from her Learning Annex course to a bar to flirt with guys, I could definitely now teach someone how to meet people “in the wild”, as they say now, without using dating apps. But don’t ask me how to find a boyfriend or lock down a husband. Still figuring all that out myself.

1. Nothing materialized with Brewpub guy btw. He made me a summer playlist that was surprisingly good, but he turned out to be an IRL ‘pen pal’, a popular term on dating apps for someone who messages you a lot but never makes an effort to meet up in person. Brewpub guy started sending me “good morning” texts and also sent me a photo of his workout equipment, followed by a shirtless dirty mirror selfie?? Even if you meet a guy off the dating apps, you can’t always stop them from engaging in app-like behavior.

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The book is also available on Amazon (Kindle edition).