02/13/23

my mom was married to my dad five months before she turned 25. she met him when she was a senior in college and the rest is history – they are still happily married, and they are such a strong example of love to me and my brother.

however, I am now 26 and my brother is a few months from turning 23 and we are both single. I have explained to my mom that people in our generation are trending towards getting married later in life (if at all), but she has decided that she wants us to “get back out there.” (NOTE: obviously with all generalizations there are exceptions, I am well aware that people are still getting married in college/straight out of college/in their very early 20s – and that is awesome for them, truly).

I know she just worries about us and wants us to be happy, and also my brother and I tend to stay single for a long time once we get out of a relationship. for example, my high school boyfriend broke up with me when I was a sophomore in college, and I didn’t date again until my second year of law school. same for my brother, he dated a girl in high school and then didn’t date again until his junior year of college. so I think she also wants us to push against our comfort zones – as of this post, it’s already been a year since I broke up with my last boyfriend so the trend continues.

all this to say, the past weekend I went to an event at the zoo called “Meet Your Next Ex” – a 21+ singles night. I went with my cousin and her friend, and it was an interesting experience. after scanning our tickets and getting in, we were given a name tag and then told to choose a color that indicated what we were looking for (blue = interested in men, yellow = interested in women, green = interested in everybody, red = interested in no one). after getting our name tags on, we went and saw the hippos which was honestly my favorite part because the zookeepers were feeding them, so the hippos were standing up in the water and opening their HUGE jaws to catch pieces of romaine lettuce. I could have stayed there the whole night but my cousin and her friend were on the hunt.

after leaving my beloved hippos, we rode the carousel (I picked a howling wolf as my animal of choice), and then it was time for speed dating. the thing about this night was that for the most part, it seemed like most people there were 35 and up. nobody was creepy, but speed dating was less of dating and more of talking politely to strangers for a couple minutes at a time until it was over.

after speed dating, we watched a free screening of planet earth in 4D, and then we stumbled across some burlesque dancers. that was pretty much the nail in the coffin for me, so after that I peaced out and left my cousin and her friend to mix and mingle as they pleased. all in all, was it the worst way to spend a Saturday night? of course not, and it provided a fun and funny story. did I meet the love of my life and/or my next ex? no, but there’s always next year.

things I am grateful for: hippos; carousels; and taking my own car to events so I can leave whenever I want.