The Wednesday Rule, among the simplest, is probably the Rule most quoted by people who don't know much about the Rules: Do not accept a Saturday night date after a Wednesday.
Corollaries addressed within the Rules (implicitly or explicitly):
- Don't return a call before you otherwise would (applying the Rules) to artificially meet this deadline.
- Tell him you have plans, even if your "plans" are cleaning your apartment.
- It is helpful to actually make plans with girlfriends for Saturday night so that you do not have to think about how you will be cleaning your apartment on Saturday night while turning down the date invitation.
I'll reserve ruling on the merits of the Wednesday Rule for the moment, but suffice to say that one of the complaints about the Rule is that there is little discretion involved. It's too black-and-white.
Leave it to my life to make this complicated.
Via e-mail (relevant portions, not verbatim)
FB guy - Tuesday: Will you be around this weekend?
Me - Wednesday : Yep
FB guy - Thursday: Want to do something Saturday night?
Me - *headdesk*
Technically he asked me about the weekend before the Wednesday deadline. I was considering using this as a loophole to accept the date, but PRG set me straight. He did not book me Tuesday or Wednesday, so I had to say no. I did so on Friday, and felt HORRIBLE about it for pretty much the entire day. Then on Saturday night I watched "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" DVDs at my sisters' apartment.
This week (I'll just skip the somewhat weird results from my saying Saturday wasn't good for me), he called me on Tuesday and asked me out for Saturday. Good, right? Well, he wants to do something in the afternoon followed by early dinner.
The Rules free me from worrying about his motives or whatnot, there could be several and I highly doubt he has another date after me. The important question is what do the Rules say I do about this?
- I have to end the date first. If I suspect he might have plans afterward, this could be tricky.
- I cannot accept a spontaneous invitation to hang out with him afterward.
- Arguably, if he changes things up on me and calls Thursday or Friday to say he wants to have a later dinner instead, I can't accept this.
Fascinating.
Here is my question: What is inherently wrong with being hard to get? And why is it ubiquitously conflated with playing hard to get? I think it's ridiculous how quickly people jump to the conclusion that women are playing hard to get, and playing games, and denounce the practice.
ReplyDeleteI mean, I go through the same things where I don't return a text or don't accept a last minute request to "meet [him] out tonight" or don't invite him up to my place, and then, invariably, I worry that he thinks I'm trying to telegraph a lack of interest and that he'll poof for that reason even though I AM interested and I wish he wouldn't and I wish I could just put less-fun things like getting rest and staying on top of my life off to get to see him just this once. Sometimes I do - for the most part, these are good guys who probably do respect and like me and aren't the kind of obvious trouble that I would want to weed out on a first pass.
But you know what? I can really live without that whole cycle. Honestly. I'm kind of over the falling-for-someone I used to do, where I hope and pine for him a lot and make time for him, move things around to see him and just generally get-it-to-happen and then see-what-it-is.
I'm not a homeowner yet, but I will be soon - and I'm a career woman, and a dog owner, and as a "single person" my professional and personal lives are fuller now than they ever have been. In fact, my life is packed with more events and obligations and opportunities than many of the people I know who are happily married.
I don't want to make time for someone anymore - it wouldn't make sense to move so many substantial things, that I've worked so hard to bring into my life, to the back of the line for something that I'm curious about. I have plenty of free time - most weekends are completely open for me, until Wednesday. But then, on Thursday, I want to know what I'm doing on the weekend, so I can plan to do the things I have to do (groceries, laundry, dog groomed, bangs trimmed) and some of the things I enjoy doing (yoga, coffee shop, friends' BBQs, movies, shopping, a cappella practice).
If that makes me hard to get, then FINE. I'm tired of trying to play like I'm not.