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This week is the worst week of the year. That is an objective fact. Sure, the week following 4th of July celebrations is absolutely terrible but you still have two whole months of summer to partake in your usual self-destruction. This week? A hundred times worse. It’s September, the weather is turning, the beach club and pool club become barren and you trade in your shorts for jeans or khakis. Or, I don’t know, whatever other type of preferred legwear there is.
Don’t get me wrong – fall is actually my favorite season of the year. Playoff baseball begins sooner than later and you have the return of college football and the NFL to coincide. There is no shortage of shit to watch and food to eat. Tailgates, grilling, drinking, pick-up football, and everything else all make fall worthwhile.
But, I’m not here to talk about that. Those previously listed items are tangible, already known things. I am here to talk about a subject I feel is tip-toed around too often: The Fall/Winter Companion. Everyone wants one, everyone needs one, and it’s getting to be that time to find one.
Right now is the buffer period, which is a beautiful time. Everyone is going to their preferred bars in New York City to watch the beginning of football season. This coming weekend is the first NFL Sunday of 2017 at SideBar. I have personally only been once and it wasn’t for me, but I know how highly attended that venue becomes for the 4 o’clock games. Every bar has their own college football fan base (Penn State at Tonic East, Michigan at Professor Thom’s, Alabama at The Ainsworth, the powerhouse Boston College at Brazen Fox, just to name a few), so no matter where you go it will be a great time.
Once we get into the thick of the season, though, it becomes increasingly apparent that one simply cannot go into winter without the aforementioned companion. It certainly isn’t like college where everyone was boozed up regardless of the day of the week, throwing caution to the wind and going home with each other left and right. Nope, the vetting process for a proper cold-weather compadre begins now.
Now, the purpose of the search is obviously for the generic stuff. Staying in on a night where you would normally drink to enjoy a movie or low key game viewing party. Going out together or with each other’s friends and enjoying the fall weather. Hell, you can even Instagram together, go crazy for all I care. It is literally what you make it. Or, it could be as simple as hooking up and then leaving each other’s apartments. You’re young (or old, who cares) and ready to make the best of a scenario that you may think is uncomfortable but is a crucial part of any winter well spent.
It’s necessary to address that this person does not have to be someone that you are interested in dating for the long haul. Speaking from literally no experience, as you get older this will change. But for my purposes, it is going in with the base thought of finding that person you want around until you both decide that it’s summer, you’re going to be at a share house every weekend, and will most likely be looking for other people as human nature takes over during the summer months.
No one wants to spend a cold night in the winter alone with no one to talk to or share shitty Chinese food with. That’s boring, and frankly, a bit sad. But, if you find the right person the winter could be a grand old time. Enjoying each others company, setting up one another’s friends with each other and maybe, just maybe, deciding to stick it out together.
It’s a great time of year and it shouldn’t be taken for granted. “Cuffing Season” (as the kids are calling it) is going to viciously sneak up on us, and if you don’t act appropriately, you could be left in the dust settling for the undesirables that you wouldn’t give a second thought to in peak-July form. Is this a touch shallow? Yes, but it needs to be said.
Good luck out there everyone. I’m rooting for you. .
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Respond
I was dating a guy for most of last winter and ended things mid-Spring. We recently reconnected and I was looking forward to having someone for the Fall/Winter again. I then realized things ended because he was awful not because the seasons changed. I went and bought a new blanket instead.
Sup
Goddamnit.
Cuffing season talk just dialed my anxiety up to 10.
I’m already phoning it in. My Fall/Winter companion is just going to be seasonal beer.
So this is why Todd is FINALLY proposing. Well joke’s on him because you can be married but lonely as ever.
As she slowly but surely pushes his friends away one by one to get him to spend more time with her, he comes to resent her, and regret his decision but feels trapped, and she nags him constantly to participate in every inane thing she comes up with from instagram or pinterest, and his kids come to resent him for having no spine until he snaps and bangs his secretary and she takes half of everything in the divorce, including the kids, and then he throws himself into his work and spends his free time at the titter.
I’m sorry you had to go through that. I didn’t mean to stir up bad memories.
uhhh i live in texas and will prob be at the pool halfway through october…
Ha! I’ll be at the pool year round in Miami! If I still have one after this weekend… fuck.
Amen
It was only like 90 today! Perfect pool weather
Any females in the Chicago area want to set up a “if we’re both single by late October” kinda situation?
Sup?
Can confirm. Went one one date and get a text the next day, “so are you looking for a relationship?”
WELL ARE YOU
Respond “just until Spring rolls around” PGPM
“I’m open to one, just maybe not with you.”
I meant when someone asks me this right before a first date or during a first date.
Sup?
I hate that fucking question. How do you respond to that? I’m not husband hunting like my roommate or feel the need to be in a relationship with someone just to have someone around. I’m not opposed to being in a relationship but I would have to be with someone I’m super excited about.
Between this, Todd proposing and coming off a long weekend I’ve got pretty bad scaries.
There needs to be a spoiler tag like on other sites.
Between this and Duda’s column, y’all got me going in all in. Shooting my shot this weekend.
I don’t know who Liz Nagy from Chicago’s ABC affiliate is, but she’s welcome to stay in Houston as long as she wants.
Dude…I know her. I’m friends with her sister and it’s really weird seeing her brought up lol. For the record she’s recently married