How to Pick Up a Guy for a One Night Stand
Part of a series of stories on experiences that the pandemic has endangered — and whether they're worth saving.
After months of putting his dating life on pause because of the coronavirus pandemic, Harrison Forman, a 28-year-old producer and comedian in New York City, was lonely enough that he was willing to take a risk, as responsibly as possible.
At a Zoom happy hour he met a woman who was a friend of a friend, they started texting — and then he started popping the quarantine questions: Who do you live with? Have you been wearing your mask? Have you been in any big groups recently? Have you been tested?
Though some of her Instagram photos of social gatherings concerned him, she answered Forman's questions satisfactorily enough that he felt comfortable meeting for a masked walk. After several hours together, he invited her up to his apartment. But since his Manhattan building has a rule against visitors, Forman first had to have an awkward conversation with his doorman. "I just said: 'Hey, this is a new friend of mine. Don't worry, we're both safe.' "
Once inside Forman's apartment, the masks came off … and pretty quickly, other clothing did, too.
He's not the only one still pursuing casual sex in the middle of a pandemic. You might think that during covid-19, one-night stands would be off the table. Who wants to take the physical and emotional risk? And plenty of singles are going on digital dates for weeks or months before getting physical.
But others are forging ahead more quickly, with no intention of seeing the person again. They're asking a lot of questions about their prospective partner's exposure, going for it if they feel safe and then quarantining just long enough that they can get busy again — with someone new.
For some singles who are quarantining alone, the need for human connection is worth the potential exposure. As Krista, a 44-year-old woman in San Francisco, puts it: "I would risk my health a lot sooner for a sexual experience than I would for a haircut." Sarah H., a 31-year-old woman in Philadelphia, feels that locking lips is the big risk, so "if you're going to kiss someone, you might as well sleep with them." (Several people in this story spoke on condition of first name only for personal privacy reasons.)
Forman finds that the pre-date interrogation that happens in the era of covid-19 dating ratchets up all kinds of intimacy quickly. "Once the kiss happens … because you already went through all these other layers [of questions], you almost get to a fourth date know-how on a first date," he says. "Even if it wasn't going to turn into a girlfriend situation, we both just needed spontaneity that we hadn't really had for months."
Anna Muldoon, a former government science policy adviser — and now a PhD candidate at Arizona State University researching the relationship between disease outbreaks and social crises — sees this moment as a chance for more careful thought before getting physical. "It makes people think through that one-night stand before they do it," Muldoon says, adding that conversations about social distancing and potential exposure to covid-19 are "expansions of the conversations one would hope people would have with each other before sleeping together." She hopes these frank talks will make it easier to talk about consent, sexually transmitted infections and sexual preferences.
Martin Valderruten, a 25-year-old gay man and event planner in New York City, says many gay daters like him are used to asking one another, very quickly, about the last time they were tested for sexually transmitted infections, or if they're taking PReP, the prophylactic drug taken to prevent HIV infection. Now his urgent queries are more like: "Have you been quarantining?"
He's been careful during the past few months, but he's still having casual sex when he feels comfortable. "As much as I want to have fun … I want to make sure I'm being cautious," Valderruten says, "and safety for me has always been key."
Ellis, a 23-year-old non-binary individual and social media manager in Montana, has been seeking out different kinds of partners than they usually would. Before the coronavirus pandemic, they would be thrilled to match with a flight attendant from Los Angeles who's just passing through — now, that's "the last person I want to meet up with because [they're] the highest risk."
Instead, they've been hooking up with a trusted friend who's already in their bubble, and another occasional partner who's been doing a good job of isolating. "I'm finding ways to get that quick-fix, noncommittal validation and intimacy out of casual and trusted connections," Ellis says, adding that such encounters are "more preferable than getting that out of a new person every time."
But some singles, frankly, would much prefer a new person every time. While Krista from San Francisco says she wants a committed relationship, such an arrangement seems particularly difficult to land right now. "Everyone's dealing with this incredibly unique, bizarre situation we're in — economic uncertainty, health uncertainty, inability to travel," she says, adding that she "wouldn't think that I would meet someone who's at their best right now. I know I'm not."
So she's just trying for a one-off hookup. When she asked a dating-app match to tell her what his bubble had looked like for the past month, and he said he'd only been seeing his dad, she thought he sounded responsible — and so she went over to his place for sex and has no plans to see him again. How does she know who to trust? "It's all in how and what they answer with," Krista says. "If they don't have to think about it or explain their answer, I believe them."
For all the noise about dating apps encouraging promiscuity among young people, in pre-covid-19 days the country was in the middle of a "sex recession," with record numbers of young people reporting that they hadn't had sex in the past year. And though people are still getting it on in 2020, these are anxious, unsexy times. Justin Lehmiller, an expert in sexuality at Indiana University's Kinsey Institute, has found in his research that whether you're single or in a relationship, "levels of interest in sex and sexual desire are down right now, and it's in part because you've got those elevated feelings of loneliness and elevated stress."
The end of a good casual connection can hit a bit harder in a pandemic. Forman and his date met up twice before she ghosted him, which was disappointing, he says, because he'd spent so much energy screening people — and he couldn't just pop into a bar and meet someone else. "I was bummed," he says. "It's like you hiked across the desert, you found this great well — and then it dried up."
This story has been updated.
Read more from our series on endangered experiences:
Request for Reader Submission
Tell us how the coronavirus crisis has affected a relationship or your experience living alone
The Washington Post would like to hear from you. How has social distancing changed your relationship with a romantic partner, friend or family member? Have you started a new relationship? Have you been quarantined at home with an ex or amid a divorce? If you or someone you know has contracted the coronavirus, how has that affected a relationship? What is living alone like right now?
We respect your privacy and will not publish your name or response without contacting you first. Read our full submission guidelines here.
Tell the Post
How to Pick Up a Guy for a One Night Stand
Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2020/08/24/hookup-casual-sex-dating-tinder-pandemic-one-night-stand/