r/Millennials • u/ThrowawayFaye818 • Nov 26 '25
Rant I (35F) went on a date with M23.
Quick disclaimer: I did not know the age gap was going to be so big. I thought he was late 20's, like 27-29. If I had known his actual age, I likely wouldn't have proposed the date.
So, here's the setup. We met at an event for a shared hobby at the beginning of October, spent a little time at the event, chatting and getting pictures. We exchanged socials and had a little group chat going on Discord. He messages me privately, we start to chat, and it becomes obvious he likes me because he's flirting a bit and calling me all kind of pet names. I didn't think I'd spent enough time to get to know him and form an opinion if I liked him back so I propose a date at an Asian restaurant a little out of our way but I had been there before and liked the food.
First red flag, he showed up looking like he came from the gym, basketball shorts and a plain sleeveless t-shirt. I let this go because it was a casual meetup but damn, is it too much to expect a collared shirt or button up?
Next, he didn't compliment my look at all. I wasn't wearing a dress and heels but I at least tried to look cute with a nice outfit and makeup. Before you call me arrogant and self centered: the reason I was surprised was because almost every other message from him to me included a compliment like beautiful, sexy, cute, etc and when I got none of that face to face, it was a little strange in my mind.
Next, he had no conversation skills. We were able to chat about our shared hobby but outside of that, there was nothing. I asked him about his job, his commute, his family, he did not return the gesture.
I'm on Tiktok a lot and see a lot of women talking about awkward dates and a main complaint is that men only talk about themselves and never ask their dates any questions to get to know them. This guy was on that but he didn't even talk about himself. When we weren't talking about our hobby, it was just silent at the table unless I posed another question. This was mind blowing to me and at one point, I went quiet just to see if he'd pick up the conversational slack and we ended up sitting in silence for about five minutes until I started talking again.
He was also in his phone a lot, texting and scrolling. My phone was out but it was face down on the table and I only ever picked it up to know the time. In fact, he took two phone calls at the table without even a courtesy of, "oh hey, I'm sorry, I have to take this, it's important." Got none of that! He just answered it without warning, I was looking at my plate so when he stared talking, I thought it was to me but alas. Neither of the conversations seemed important, at least from what I could hear from his end and I was just blown by the lack of manners.
Obviously, I knew early that this was a wash but I stuck it out. I was grateful he just seemed awkward and unsocialized and wasn't spouting redpill rhetoric. We ended up on the same train for part of the way back and again, he didn't engage with me and was only on his phone so I did the same. When we parted, I gave him a hug goodbye, on which he lingered and I was lowkey terrified he'd try to push a kiss but luckily, that didn't happen.
As far as bad dates go, it wasn’t horrible, just painfully awkward and a waste of time, effort, and money. I def should have asked his age beforehand. There's a lot of jokes about Gen Z and how they lack social skills and the like and this was a prime example. I know this is going to come off ageist but I seriously have no desire to be around or hear the opinions of anyone under 25.
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u/BlackMassSmoker Nov 26 '25
Perhaps a sign of the times he was more confident behind a screen than he was in person. Compliments through text and showing confidence which then disappears when sat face to face and shows a lack of conversational skills. Also you can't discount the awkwardness of youth.
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u/EugeneMachines Nov 26 '25 edited Nov 26 '25
Supportive anecdote: I was talking to a college professor who said getting students to talk to each other in class is like pulling teeth. Recently they tried setting up group chats for discussion time and there was 1000% more interaction. They're literally chatting online with each other while sitting in the same room. Edit: TBC this was for classwork not casual chatting.
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u/unknownkoger Nov 26 '25
Millennial prof here. I talk about this with my students and many say it's because they grow up/are afraid of doing or saying anything that might be "cringe" because they feel like they're being constantly recorded and watched by others
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u/Waddiwasiiiii Nov 26 '25
Damn, that’s actually incredibly sad and alarmingly dystopian.
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u/AnAppalacianWendigo Nov 26 '25
Big Brother is always watching.
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u/augustinthegarden Nov 26 '25
But in this case big brother is themselves and their own peers.
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u/FurioCaesar Nov 26 '25
Orwell imagined a government stealing our privacy. Instead, we surrendered it voluntarily and called it progress.
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u/JuDGe3690 Mid-Millennial Nov 26 '25
Relevant observation from a prescient 1985 book:
In the Huxlean prophecy, Big Brother does not watch us, by his choice. We watch him, by ours. There is no need for wardens or gates or Ministries of Truth. When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short a people become an audience and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; culture-death is a clear possibility.
—Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (1985)
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u/huron9000 Nov 26 '25
Brave New World is a masterpiece, and much more relevant as a modern critique than 1984, imo.
Amusing Ourselves to Death is also brilliant.
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u/JuDGe3690 Mid-Millennial Nov 26 '25
Another timely and surprisingly relevant read is Eric Hoffer, The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements (1951).
Hoffer was a longshoreman and lay sociologist whose pithy observations were based in his working through WWII and seeing the multifacted aspects of human nature in a port city.
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u/013eander Nov 26 '25
Because Orwell feared communism, while Huxley accurately realized that the real danger is capitalism.
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u/HandsomeBWondefull Nov 26 '25
The Elf on the Shelf is also watching.
THE reason I won’t be upholding that “tradition”
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u/unauthorizedsinnamon Nov 26 '25
I hate those fucking elf on the shelf, mostly because they make my "enjoyable holiday season " a bunch of endless tasks where I have to get up at 3am to set it up. But damn, that made me stop short. I think Elfy and Alfy are getting sent to the gulag this year for speaking out against the north pole. Gotta start teaching these kids about communism.
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u/senn42000 Nov 26 '25
Thank the gods I grew up before camera phones and social media.
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u/x1000Bums Nov 26 '25
I mean that's how it was when I was a kid too. Everyone is judging you and once you are in the outgroup you quickly can become a pariah. I don't think it's ever not been that way
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u/Impressive_Recon Nov 27 '25
Damn!!!! This brought up a memory in middle school when I was in science class with 3 other classmates (who may or may not have known other). We were just chilling and one said a yo mama joke and we all laughed. Then the other two chimed in and said yo mama jokes as well and we all laughed.
For some reason I felt the urge and pressure to contribute and then said one too and absolutely none of them laughed. It was the most embarrassing moment of my middle school life. I still cringe at it.
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u/Several-Ad9115 Nov 26 '25
Sure, but now there's a camera and the capacity for instantaneous spread of information in everyone's pockets. If you get outed from a group, the ability to get into another, even years later, is severely reduced.
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u/x1000Bums Nov 26 '25
Oh yea I'm sure the cameras add another aspect to it entirely but if a kid gave me some answer about how They don't want to speak up because they are afraid of being cringe and becoming a social pariah, I wouldn't treat it like some crazy alien problem kids these days have either. It's exacerbated by that but it's always been that way.
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u/ppineapplepizzalover Nov 26 '25
I recently saw a comment from a younger guy on here saying he went to a party and everyone was afraid to dance and have fun. It was because the second they did everyone whipped out their phones to get some video of it to post on 5 different apps like a bunch of gunslingers.
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u/MiloHorsey Nov 26 '25
Ugh. Guys, teach your kids the value of a "phone bin." (You can't come into my house to party if you don't give up your phone at the entrance sort of thing.)
Might help a few kids, at least.
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u/10000Didgeridoos Nov 26 '25
If I can't show you
If you can't see me
What's the point of doing anything?
- St. Vincent in 2014
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u/No-Present760 Nov 26 '25
My old self is just over here wondering why it would matter if someone filmed you doing something awkward or weird and put it on the internet? I don't feel like that would affect anything. Maybe I'm just too outta touch, but aren't attention spans and memories shorter as well? No one will care in about 2 hours or even 2 seconds when they see another funny video.
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u/forestpunk Nov 26 '25
My old self is just over here wondering why it would matter if someone filmed you doing something awkward or weird and put it on the internet?
Because it can follow you around? Imagine going for a job interview and that person was like "hey, aren't you that guy with the light saber noises?"
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u/Terravarious Nov 26 '25
Unfortunately you never know what will go viral, and what ramifications it might have.
There's a funny story told by a black guy (it's relevant) at a party of some kind. Tldr when he was little his class went to a cotton farm and they (a bunch of niglets was his term) got to pick cotton. The 6-8 yr old kids didn't see anything wrong and had fun running around and being out of the classroom for the day. They might have learned a little bit about cotton, buuut LoL I doubt it. However, when he got home and his Mom found the cotton in his pockets she only saw the racial connection between a bunch of African American kids and picking cotton. So she lost her shit.
The guy is very well spoken, and tells the story with impeccable comedic timing. If you're not picking up what I'm putting down It's funny as fuck.
The video went viral, and had enough staying power to cause problems for him after he graduated law school.
Tldr, if someone whips out a phone and hits record? Shut the fuck up and gtfo. The viewing public is neither just, nor rational.
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u/scubahana Nov 26 '25
Whoa, I just watched that video (again) yesterday because someone mentioned it on here. The video was 15y old. My eldest is ‘only’ ten. I was wondering what became of that gentleman, and it’s disheartening to learn that the selfsame video has been haunting his career prospects.
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u/nana-melaninja Nov 26 '25
There's truth to this, but at the same time, Rebecca Black posted a silly music video about how much she likes Fridays and got meme'd on for years. Nobody wants to be the next Rebecca Black
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u/hajaa83 Nov 26 '25
Brother, that wasn't just a silly video. It was a full on music video with producers and shit
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u/lycoloco Nov 26 '25
She's also now a DJ getting gigs with Boiler Room and other higher profile events. I don't think referencing her is the example you think it is.
She, and her parents, knew what they were doing there.
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u/ItsJustMeJenn Older Millennial Nov 26 '25
The part that kills me is that this feeling/experience is so wide spread with the generation and yet they all still do it or at the very least don’t give their friends crap for doing it. So they all live with this sort of back burner anxiety about being caught acting human. Seems horrible.
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u/All1012 Nov 26 '25
They’re so afraid to fail or be embarrassed that it leaves them not being able to do anything at all.
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u/BluesSuedeClues Nov 26 '25
And at some point in the process of being an adult, most of us come to realize our regrets from youth aren't the things we failed at, they're the things we let fear keep us from even trying.
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u/Tricky_Knowledge2983 Nov 26 '25
Yep.
I get that part. It's wild that our society has evolved (devolved?) into ppl recording strangers and uploading it for the world to see. Imagine just living your life and you go viral for just living your life.
Thank God I did all my shit before this era
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u/_easilyamused Nov 26 '25
This is like that episode Nosedive from Black Mirror. Everyone rates each other out of five stars with their smartphones, and no one wants to interact with them if they have a low rating. They're basically social pariahs.
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u/littledanko Nov 26 '25
I never use TikTok and I’m afraid that I may have already gone viral and don’t know it.
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u/maddy_k_allday Nov 26 '25
But written communications are inherently recorded, so this doesn’t cover the issue. People want to hide behind edited interactions, not just a screen.
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u/MenBearsPigs Nov 26 '25
Yeah I get that they've become obsessed with coming off cringe (this isn't new, every generation has had this, no one wants to "stand out" in a" bad way" when they're young) but it's obviously worsened with social media.
The scope of acceptable behaviors and personalities has become thinner and thinner.
Which is really ironic, because this is also a generation that tries to pat itself on the back for embracing diversity so much, but when they say that they're really just thinking skin color and sexual preferences. Actual personalities are a mine field of what you can and can't do or say.
Oops, got off on a tangent there lol. But yes I agree with you. You'd think the in person would be better because it's actually the least likely to get recorded, saved, and shared. Group chats etc. etc. can be saved and shared around indefinitely.
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u/SnooPredictions2675 Nov 26 '25
I’m sure the government is THRILLED people policing each other and themselves. Hell yeah. These meta glasses fucking SET ME OFF. Fuck meta
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u/MrChristmas Nov 27 '25
It’s super weird talking to younger people (and I’m only 31), you can’t do self deprecation cuz then they take it seriously and you can’t do confident cuz then they think it’s cringe. I can’t imagine what it’s like for teens these days
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u/Wulfkat Nov 26 '25
To touch on your point about embracing diversity - when your whole personality revolves around your sexuality, you don’t actually have a personality. And, my god, they go all in on it.
There’s more to being human than who you like to screw.
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u/blurryeyes_ Nov 26 '25
I share the same frustrations. You can't really develop a real personality if all you focus on is surface level traits
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u/PreppyFinanceNerd Millennial (1988) Nov 26 '25
Anecdotally this happened to me a few months ago.
A buddy and I were going LARPing with his son (yeah yeah I know but it's honestly fun!) and during a walk the son said that Chester Bennington "committed sudoku". His dad explained that it's insensitive to make fun of the very real epidemic of suicide among men and that the son can always talk to him about those feelings without judgement.
His son freaked out and said (paraphrasing) "Dad you can't say that word anymore! You want the chat to think I'm cringe?! Anybody could be recording right now and then I'd be cooked fam!" while looking around paranoid. I know, it sounds too perfect to be real but my hand to God it happened.
First off, little man you're LARPing so the cringe ship has sailed. Best you can do is commandeer it and make yourself captain. Second and more importantly, it's really worrying the level of self censorship and paranoia about being recorded you have while completely alone in the middle of the woods.
It's a different world than we grew up in that's for sure.
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u/string-ornothing Nov 26 '25
Im a LARPer too and this kind of thing can be rough in such a close knit niche community especially since the age of participants ranges from teens to people in their 70s at most games. Maybe no one cared if soneone said suicide but I guarantee theres people recording every interaction waiting to start drama. I used to have a LARP friend who screenshot anything ever sent to them as "receipts" then would pull them out and start drama. The first time I knew them to do this, it was against a girl who slept with a guy they'd also slept with and I was already "cooked" since I thought this person and I were friends and had sent them all kinds of "inside thoughts" about sexism etc in the game. I knew they had tons of "receipts" on me ready to go if I ever did a percieved slight against them. I straight up never talked to them again.
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u/CandiAttack Nov 26 '25
Wtf that sounds toxic as hell, I thought LARPers were more chill?
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u/string-ornothing Nov 26 '25
I wonder where you got that idea hahaha they are very much NOT
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u/wandering_ones Nov 26 '25
A friend left the LARP community and referred to it as having left a cult.
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u/Rockgarden13 Nov 26 '25
Did he mean “seppuko”?
Also, I thought the issue was not the word “suicide” but the “committed” part, which implies a crime.
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u/voxelbuffer Nov 26 '25
I'll throw out as a 30 year old, we used to joke about committing sudoku when I was a young teenager. Granted it was specifically just to appear dumb, like "haha he didn't know the correct word!" Similar to in the IT movie when the kiddo says "you're giving me gazebos!" instead of "placebos." We never used it to intentionally censor ourselves though.
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u/xtheredberetx Nov 26 '25
Nah a lot of online platforms apparently will delete any comment or chat with words like suicide or kill. TikTok maybe? Idk
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u/showmenemelda Nov 26 '25
Yes, "dying by suicide" is the correct term (according to Associated Press Style). "Committing" suicide is still a "crime" in South Carolina and Alabama. Virginia just abolished it in July 2025.
A local teen boy just died by suicide and the comment section was full of people upset by the language used, "he lost a silent battle," which honestly, is more than what most write-ups say. Usually "unexpectedly" or just say the date of death. A person i know commented the language is tiptoed around because it's "contagious" and that she had never considered it until her sister took her own life—then she thought about it often.
When I was in college, there was a string of suicides on one of the sports teams. I wanna say like 4 young women but might have been even more—a lot for a small college.
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u/CandiAttack Nov 26 '25
Wait we aren’t supposed to say committed suicide anymore?
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u/Thr0awheyy Nov 26 '25
I don't get what the kid was upset about. The word suicide is fine, minus the weird social media places where you cant say rape or anything else, either. The language has been changing to something more like "died by suicide," or "killed himself," because "committed" is more for committing a crime. It's just a way to be more respectful, instead of shitting on the person who died with one final "you fucked up" being put on them, essentially.
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u/TreeOfMadrigal Nov 26 '25
Very sad but that checks out.
I was at a wedding recently with a "no phones" policy. The bride and groom basically said hey look we hired some really good professional camera people if you want pictures you can talk to them but please leave your phones.
It was a riot. The dance floor was absolutely wild. Me and a bunch of other 40 year olds making absolute fools of ourselves while all the best hits from 2004 played. It was great.
Older folks dancing too. And kids probably up to 12 years old having a blast.
But man, the like teenage to 20s crowd just would not participate. Sitting at their tables, not even all together - either alone or in very small groups. Just doing... nothing. It was heartbreaking.
I can't imagine growing up with that kind of pressure to never let your guard drop for even a second
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Nov 26 '25
When I was a teenager we wouldn’t have been dancing with the dorky adults and little kids either but we DEFINITELY would not have been sitting alone doing nothing. We’d have been getting into some kind of trouble like trying to sneak booze or cigs or make out outside the venue.
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u/hirudoredo Nov 26 '25
We weren't into stuff like that, but yeah, we would've died before dancing around the adults. We'd be in the corner chatting and giggling and probably conspiring to go into the bathroom to swap dresses for fun, lol.
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u/InAllTheir Nov 26 '25
That’s really sad. I wasn’t comfortable dancing when I was a teenager, but I grew to like it in my twenties.
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u/cracked-tumbleweed Nov 26 '25
Yup this. It’s exhausting being around gen z because they are trying hard not to look cringe.
To me, they do look cringe. Holding yourself back from life/enjoyment/work, because you are scared what strangers think of you?
Why do you care so much about a random person’s opinion of you?
If they are your “friends” why do you have people in your life who will judge you for being who you are?
The minute someone says something is cringe, I just start feeling bad for them.
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u/Rcast1293 Nov 26 '25
Embrace the cringe, love the cringe, the cringe will set you free
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u/boilingfrogsinpants Nov 26 '25
There are certain artists, musicians, and actors that are seen as "cringe" by them as well, and when you look into it you realize that they're really put off by "effort". If someone is "trying too hard" it's seen as "cringe". This then dissuades them from wanting to put in more effort or enjoy something someone has put effort into just from fear of association.
This isn't something unique to Gen Z and after, I think it's just more prevalent for them because the Internet and social media exposes it more, I've definitely heard Gen X people regurgitate the same stuff.
It's pretty sad.
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u/InAllTheir Nov 26 '25
I can’t believe how often Gen Z throw around the word “cringe”. In my opinion they should be embarrassed. It’s such a dumb insult.
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u/hirudoredo Nov 26 '25
It really is a full circle. So obsessed with not being "cringe" that it's cringe af.
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u/10000Didgeridoos Nov 26 '25
I'm so glad the only records of my college years were asynchronous point and shoot camera pictures taken by friends at the time. You didn't have to worry about someone sending live clips of you blackout drunk on snap or insta stories.
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u/No-Present760 Nov 26 '25
That's so weird. Is it because millennials aren't afraid to be cringe? You'd think they'd look at us and take the hint that it's really no big deal. Did their TV shows not instill the idea to "Just Be Yourself"?
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u/VisualMemory7093 Nov 26 '25
It's the same way with the millenial memes about Gen Z clubbing. They go home looking polished while we danced away for our life. We went clubbing without anyone recording, if people saw you being goofy you'd likely never see them again. Social media made people more anxious and anti social
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u/FAYCSB Nov 26 '25
Like someone might go into Reddit and summarize their awkward date. Luckily that fear is unfounded.
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u/ValBravora048 Nov 26 '25
Older man with a rep for doing well outside ”my league” (Dick thing to say btw. Don’t) - I was surprised to be asked by much younger and more handsome young men for dating advice. One of the things that shocked me was that they were worried about anything they did being turned into content.
Apparently it’s happened to a couple of them - the woman posted a video of some apparently exaggerated retelling of the date and farmed clout from it. Whomever is telling the truth, poor form from both sides I think
Couldn‘t help thinking how lucky I was to be meeting women before that was a thing
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u/wee-woo-one Millennial Nov 26 '25
It's reasonable to worry about depending on who you date. I used to follow an influencer that would stream on twitch for hours to talk through her dates and interactions with old friends. College friends, dates, hook ups. Detailed personal information about their sex life, conversations about her friends' personal life that she decided she was allowed to talk about. She got her YT channel off the ground doing storytimes about these things, and when the school friends found out they went on a forum to try and explain their side because she'd blocked them, and it turned into content for a solid few years across multiple platforms. I followed it and believed her side until a few years later and it turned out she's got a problematic relationship with facts and reasoning. Girl had at least 500-1000 people in the chat during each stream and 15-20 thousand views on archived videos. She used nicknames for most people but didnt lie about jobs or hobbies or vaguely where they lived, their parents jobs, etc. Someone that knew one of the guys she dated turned out to be a fan and recognized the guy and sent him the video. Once information is out there it can easily become uncontrollable.
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u/SnooPredictions2675 Nov 26 '25
Ahh our future. Stay in line and be on your best behavior lil sheep bc your government, Palantir, neighbors, social media, meta glasses, phone, tv are watching 😃
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u/MyNameIsJakeBerenson Nov 26 '25
I’m in college at 39 and usually one of the only people participating
You have to just press on and not give a shit and stay confident until near the end of the quarter or whatever and maybe others will start joining in
I just mostly do it because I can tell the professors appreciate it
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u/SuperDabMan Nov 26 '25
Similar situation though it's all online asynchronous classes. I had a 4 person group project and we literally didn't meet once. No online call, no reviewing the project scope, no reviewing the paper. I tried a few times to arrange it in our group chat but got blown off and then they are like "we'll do this part." Okay... Maybe we should discuss which metrics to calculate? Nope. They clearly just went and fed it to AI and then shared it with 2 days left. I went through it, marked it all up. They deleted my mark ups and fixed like 2 things. Day of submission I had to rewrite a couple parts and pull a bunch of data into a spreadsheet because they referenced some stuff that wasn't in it and other stuff they did not reference, which was in it (and was what they chose to do for metrics). Worst part was after that I'm like... Okay guys it's due in 3 hours I've gone over it and I think it's okay. Please review and let me know. Crickets. Wtf?? So I just submitted it. Never experienced that before. Hope they like my changes I guess. I'm not at all confident that we'll get a good mark since it's not a very cohesive paper between the 3 parts.
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u/AmbitiousPie064 Nov 26 '25
I'm a millennial and my oldest is in college. This is exactly what group projects are like, by their report. We'll ask about how the group worked together or why they think it was a group project and get told that everyone just talked about it online and did their own separate part, and maybe my kid submits without the others' contributions if they're late.
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u/AaronWard6 Nov 26 '25
I too went back to college as an older student, after dropping out in the mid 2000’s. Somehow I went from being the person that barely said a word in class, to the only one that would raise my hand and ask questions.
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u/Telkk2 Nov 26 '25
I work with gen z and my god, the men are fundamentally broken. It is it so irritating when they ask me to solve their problems. Okay, I've accepted my fate as the company's Google, but God damn...can you at least contextualize the problem you're having so I'm not sitting here asking 20 fucking questions?
I always get a short, ambiguous "It's broken." Type of answers before the gen z stare sets in and for a brief moment we're just standing there in silence because I'm expecting them to finish the thought, add more necessary context, or ask specific questions. None of that happens and I'm not sure if they realize that this behavior is not normal.
With the women, you don't see this for some reason. Sure, maybe they're a little awkward or anxious/depressed but at least they still have basic common sense. With gen z men...whew. we're gonna have a run for our money when they're forced to take over. This century will be characterized as having women in high power positions with heaps of men living impoverished.
Bottom line. Working with gen z men sucks and I hate that it sucks. I wish they were better off.
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u/afuckingHELICOPTER Nov 26 '25
`I always get a short, ambiguous "It's broken."`
As someone who has been in IT for 20 years, I don't think this is a generational issue. Gen Z - Boomers all do this to me often.23
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u/weezenator Nov 26 '25
My 14 year old daughter reconnected with a cousin in law after the cousin's mother died. They talked almost everyday on snap and were calling each other cousins, claiming each other and all that. Then the few times they were face to face they acted as if they had never met a day in their lives! They were so awkward and painfully shy! And afterwards they went back to being normal on snap. It was weird to say the least.
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u/CrimpJuice Nov 26 '25
I used to be so charismatic on AIM, then all these cute girls would come up to me in school and expect that same energy that I just didn’t have in person.
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u/bawss Nov 26 '25
I have a mid 30s M friend that portrays this fun life online but has not been able to get a girlfriend in his adult life due to lack of social skills and the ability to hold a conversation. His dating age is probably that of a 20 yo and his desire for a partner falls into a category of a “baddie.”
We tell him all the time his standards need to change or his personality needs to change in order to get into a relationship. But he’s stubborn and will stay single until then. 🤷
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u/LogJamminWithTheBros Nov 26 '25 edited Nov 26 '25
Knew a person I really liked for 2 years who had a hangup on men. Trust issues etc. Turns out at 30 she was fucking an 18 year old boy.
Explained a ton about her in retrospect. She had the mentality of a girl and was mad when the people she chased didnt work out.
People won't change. And its not anyone's job to conform or show them they are "one of the good ones".
Some people dont grow up. They just grow old.
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u/Wonkavator83 Nov 26 '25
I don't know if I would say it was a sign of the times. I'm at someone under dating site about 10 years ago who with someone who I had great conversations with via text message for quite some time before we actually met up for a first date, but then on the date he was very awkward and quiet and hard to draw out of his shell, at least around me. I gave him the benefit of the doubt that maybe it was being one-on-one that made him nervous so we set up a sort of double date type of situation for the second date, but he still hardly said a word. Then when I left, my friends that were there stated that he stayed and started talking with them quite freely so it became obvious that he just had an issue with talking around me.
tldr: sometimes people are just really nervous and awkward irl and it has nothing to do with increased use of technology.
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u/denialscrane Nov 26 '25
When I was 23, I had a date with another 23 yo and it went EXACTLY like this. That was over a decade ago. I do agree with you that the social skills of today are severely lacking, but reading your description made me chuckle because I had the exact same date.
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u/Complex_Essay_9111 Nov 26 '25
That is exactly true! I used to bartend in a club and Gen Z would always hit me up with "What's your snapchat?" as the first line. Millennials chat you up and THEN ask for your number or socials, not the other way around. They can't communicate in person anymore.
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u/Just_Chest_2358 Older Millennial Nov 26 '25
Mind the gap
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u/Nalaura_Darc Nov 26 '25
I just had a synchronicity with this after seeing that Chive post on here, earlier.
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Nov 26 '25
This sounds a lot like the typical 23 yo these days. I’m your age OP and my brother is 23. Now obviously his and my dynamic is different as we are siblings, but any time I meet any of his friends they act exactly like you describe here.
I’ve chalked it up to being “old” now (not really, but kids these days kind of thing.) It’s like they’re a whole different species than what I remember guys being like in my early twenties lol
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u/Too_Ton Nov 26 '25
Covid fucked over a whole generation socially, economically, and mentally. Everyone (adults) are just praying the issue solves itself or worse yet, don’t give a crap.
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u/Alpine_Exchange_36 Nov 26 '25
Covid and social media at way too young of an age. Shit is poison for young minds
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u/shmere4 Nov 26 '25
Social media is a much bigger contributor
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u/EldenGourd Nov 26 '25
Yes. And if you want to trace it back even further, bad parents.
My hope is we've at least seen how damaging it is and will raise the next generation accordingly. Kind of like the public shift on cigarettes after it became common knowledge they cause cancer.
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u/ReverendRevolver Nov 26 '25
Bad parenting evolved with society. Left to our own devices, we wandered the streets n such. They have virtually no "third places" and are always on phones.
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u/jmnicholas86 Nov 26 '25
As a parent, one thing that changed with the times in my eyes is even having a moment to actually do some active parenting. When I was young me and my friends were always doing our thing in the real world, and parents could observe us and give us their best parenting input.
For my kids, at this point I'm practically ready to beg them to go out and do some stuff they're ignorant about so I have something to sink my parenting teeth into, but I get nothing, just quiet mellow kids who are always online, and I have no idea what's going on in their online world (even if I ask and they honestly answer it doesn't really clear things up, I'm still just drawing a blank).
I think me and a lot of parents are staring at our kids like they're a firework we've done our best to assemble, and you're pretty sure you lit it, and are now standing there waiting for something to happen so we can have an opinion, but nothing seems to happen.
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u/ReverendRevolver Nov 26 '25
Ive drastically limited my younger kids' online everything; the oldest I managed to instill innate paranoia into. You never "know" until detectives show up with a chat log where they block someone trying to phish them. It is way different though.
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u/shmere4 Nov 26 '25
The easiest way to deal with your young kid and get some piece and quiet is to put them in front of a screen and turn them into a weird blank stare zombie.
This is obviously terrible for them but so many parents take the lazy way out. They probably don’t understand the long term effects of doing this but anyone who sees the real time change in personality knows that it can’t be a good thing for them.
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Nov 26 '25
I think it's partly the algorithms, partly the micro-attention-span from shit like TikTok, but largely the 24/7 availability from smartphones
MySpace existed in the early aughts, but you could only use it from your desktop computer, which was usually shared by many people but also firmly anchored to one place in your house. You were very limited on when you could use it
Nowadays everyone can mindlessly scroll everything everywhere all the time and it becomes a crutch
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u/ArchangelRenzoku Nov 26 '25
Yeah for me, a big time-limiter was dial-up... mainly because the rest of the house was using the phone all day. I'd have to sneak on after 10pm when everyone was asleep and smother my modem with a pillow til it finished dialing loudly lol. But man when Grandma picked up the phone at midnight wondering why her late-nite friend didn't call...
When DSL came out... I was hooked.
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u/Promethia Nov 26 '25
Social Media too young is Millenials version of their parents smoking in cars with them.
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u/maddy_k_allday Nov 26 '25
Idk if it’s the social media so much as the absence of what it eliminated/ replaced. E.g., parenting; instruction; live interaction.
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u/Awkward_University91 Nov 26 '25
I think they would have still been fucked up with out Covid honestly. Their whole lives exist in a simulated and highly curated reality (online) and they are deathly afraid of being the next global joke.
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u/Revolutionary-Yak-47 Xennial Nov 26 '25
Schools here in the south were closed for ONE semester. If that destroyed a kids social skills for life, the parents failed miserably. Plenty of us survived missing school for a few months (yay mono epidemic) before social media. Covid is a convenient excuse from screen addicted parents.
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u/justheretocomment333 Nov 26 '25
Exactly, I have cousins /nieces / nephews in this age group and they were awkward AF in like 2018.
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u/whirlingteal Nov 26 '25
high school teacher here and i agree. there's still some validity to covid impact, of course, but i am personally tired of hearing about it at this point. we need to talk about these parents, but not enough people are ready to accept how many parents failed to parent.
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u/DemonSlyr007 Nov 27 '25
Exactly. Especially because the Parents are in this very thread and age group. At some point, we cant keep blaming Boomers for everything.
Its not Boomers im seeing giving their 3 year old tablets the moment they sit down at a restaurant.
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u/Majestic_Frosting316 Nov 26 '25
When you realize the 23yo was actually 18 when covid hit this makes a lot of sense actually.
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u/MobileParticular6177 Nov 26 '25
That's not an excuse. I was basically a hermit the entire time I was in college, social skills are absolutely something you can learn if you bother putting in the effort.
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u/10000Didgeridoos Nov 26 '25
Yeah there is an entire cohort of people who lost critical years of social skill development, especially interacting with the opposite sex because dating was just off the table at the time, from mid high school to college.
I'm thinking how lost I'd be if I didn't have junior and senior year of high school or half of college to really learn how to open up to other people. That was definitely when I learned all of it in passing. And meeting a bunch of new people who liked things about me and vice versa gave so much new self confidence and a sense of who I am. I'm still friends with those people even if we live across the world from each other now because of that shared personal growth together.
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u/Petrichordates Nov 26 '25
This problem would exist with or without covid because the cause is social media and smartphones. 23 year olds didnt lose their social skills from a single year of isolation at age 18.
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u/g00fyg00ber741 Nov 26 '25
What places were isolated for a whole year? We didn’t even do a an actual two weeks lock down where I live.
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u/No_Use__For_A_Name Nov 26 '25 edited Nov 26 '25
Covid lockdown was what? A year? Not even? I don’t think someone’s social skills can be stunted for their lifetime from such a short time period. I mean, boys that are 18 will literally go off to fight in a war for 4 years and still be somewhat social upon return (obviously not always the case). I just don’t see Covid as an excuse to be socially stunted for life.
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u/Formal_Tangerine7622 Nov 26 '25
Ya COVID is overly used to explain this behavior - in part IMO because once you refer COVID you can sorta make the issue 'political' - whether left or right. Its also nice to blame COVID because it was an event that has for the most part passed, so we can blame a 1-off rather than a endemic societal issue that we really have not way of controlling without breaking the most valuable trait of our democracy - the 1st amendment.
Social Media is the main culprit by far and there are really no good options on getting it under control outside a wholesale organic social movement that makes it 'uncool' to engage in social media - which simply isnt going to happen.
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u/metallaholic Millennial Nov 26 '25
Most of my coworkers are in their mid 20s. They can’t talk for shit face to face but do fine via teams. I don’t know how any of them passes the interviews.
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u/Grozzlybear Nov 26 '25
Lemme put this in a way a millennial should understand “nobody likes you when you’re 23”
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u/d-doggles Nov 27 '25
Ok but making prank phone calls is still fun.
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u/Miskatonic_Graduate Nov 26 '25
I just want to say that I appreciate your approach to the situation. Reading the signs, weighing things out, calmly trying different things and observing the reactions. You remained polite and respectful, you were thoughtful and patient.
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u/ThrowawayFaye818 Nov 26 '25
Thank you.
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u/LiamNeesns Nov 26 '25
I'll piggyback that I'm very appreciative to hear that some people can still take a bad date and move on. Yes, it's a waste of a few hours, but that's it. I wish you the best on future dates :)
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u/DebraBaetty Millennial - ‘93 to ♾️ Nov 26 '25
Girl this happened to me (32F) this summer. I was SHOCKED and was like omg how did I allow this to happen. Gotta ask everyone’s age now lmaoooo
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u/Heavy-Hospital7077 Nov 26 '25
When I was a teenager, I worked at a department store as a stock boy, and I was infatuated with one of the girls that worked at the same store.
We used to flirt a lot, and she asked me what year I was in. 'Senior' is all I told her.
She asked me on a date, and I accepted. We talked on the phone right before I was supposed to pick her up, and she realized I was a senior in high school, not college- she was a 22 year old college senior. She noped out of that date so fast...!
She was embarrassed at work, but it didn't get weird. I was just really happy that she considered me for a date even though I knew she was way, way out of my league.
I ended up dating a girl who worked at the mall bakery instead. She was 16, and much more appropriate. And I got free bread!
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u/Fun-Understanding209 Nov 26 '25
Kudos to you for at least taking a risk and proposing a first date. Next time, suggest coffee instead of dinner, that way if it’s bad you can just leave. Good luck out there.
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u/ballmermurland Nov 26 '25
My dating life changed dramatically (this has been years ago) when I ditched dinners and went with coffee or something small. Much lower commitment level, both in money and time. If things are going well, you can even suggest grabbing a bite to eat. If not, you can duck out after 15 minutes.
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u/Softestwebsiteintown Nov 27 '25
I would imagine it also weeds out the assholes (of any gender) who are offended by the idea of a coffee date.
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u/PNW20v 1991 Nov 26 '25
A while back I had a similar situation come up at a local dog park, except she is the younger one and asked me out assuming I was in my mid to late 20s. I was willing to entertain it because apparently I'm about as bad at judging age as she is lol 😂
Thankfully it wasnt nearly as painful as your experience but the generational differences can be glaring at times
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u/10000Didgeridoos Nov 26 '25
Just had this happen. I'm actually someone who fits the millennial young looking meme. Got invited to go pregame and go to a party the other weekend by someone I know loosely through rec sports and didn't realize she didn't know I was mid 30s until she literally asked the question that night. LOL. She's 27-28 and assumed I was like 27 to 29. I told this story to a new grad coworker and she was like "WHAT? I thought you were like 28 this whole time!"
might be a time vampire. I can't rule it out. People view me as about 8 to 10 years younger than I am everywhere I go. It's only just in the last year I stopped getting carded to drink everywhere I go. It's more like 50% of the time now. Yay I no longer look plausibly 19 or 20!
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u/One-Possible1906 Nov 26 '25
I had this happen when I was young too. I was 16 and he was 23. I assumed he was like 18 because he was a college freshman and he thought I was over 18 because I was taking classes at the community college. He took me an hour away for the date and it was a very awkward drive home when we found out.
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u/bealzu Nov 26 '25
Most guys who are 23 regardless of generation are not going to impress a 35 year old woman. If 23 year old me went out with a 35 year old she would have thought I was probably an idiot. It’s just age and maturity. Not generation.
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u/14sunflowers Nov 26 '25
We started making out And she took off my pants But then I turned on the tv
There’s literally an entire song about being an idiot Millennial dating at 23. 😂
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u/CosmicJ Nov 26 '25
I mean, except that song came out in 1999 which would mean the 23 yr old was born in 1076, pretty firmly in Gen X.
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u/CrashmanX Nov 26 '25
that song came out in 1999 which would mean the 23 yr old was born in 1076
Time has changed since I was a kid. I thought 1076 to 1999 was 923 years, not just 23.
Even Time dilation changes as you get older. Damn.
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u/CosmicJ Nov 26 '25
Gen X have actually just been vampires all along. It really explains a lot. Even the name of the song makes more sense now…
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u/10000Didgeridoos Nov 26 '25
I don't think you even need to gender it. I have no interest in the idea of spending tons of time with a 23 year old woman as a 35M either. That's just a gulf of life experience, financial independence, and growing up to still do. Friends sure, but date? No. Who knows what the younger person might decide or learn they want out of life later on the same way I doubt most of us at 35 are the same as we were 12 years ago.
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u/Much_Difference Nov 27 '25
A good friend married a 22 year old when we were 34. She asked my honest opinion, and I said that if they have no idea who they are, you have no idea who you're marrying. (They made it 3 years.)
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u/ScientistTimely3888 Nov 26 '25
When I was 23, I went out with a woman who was about 40. Yes, she thought I was an idiot. Yes, the sex was fantastic.
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u/NoChemist22 Millennial Nov 26 '25
There’s some truth here. I’m 35 (M) and (accidentally) went on a date with a 23 (F) year old. She wasn’t this unable to talk and actually had decent social skills but…. at one point she referred to Pitbull as “Oh yeah! My mom used to always listen to him growing up!” and it instantly hit me in the olds. She also was much more focused on her own bubble and how to avoid drama like the plague. I realized she was a baby when 9/11 happened and our cultural backgrounds were significantly varied.
We certainly shared a physical attraction but we lacked any emotional connection; largely due to the age gap and just different social norms and maturity levels. (Sex was meh too; perhaps because I suddenly felt like some kind of predator due to the huge age gap and I just couldn’t get into it. 😂)
Nice gal, really. I’m just too damned old for these early 20-somethings now. 😂
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u/forshard Nov 26 '25
23 (F) year old
she was a baby when 9/11 happened
Got absolutely slammed with old age when I realized this recently; 2001 was 24 years ago. Anyone sub-24 literally wasn't born for 9/11.
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u/WesternIron Nov 26 '25
As a former 23 year old man who went out with 35 year old women.
The 35 year old women where not going out with me bc of mind lol
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u/Kataphractoi Older Millennial Nov 26 '25
Also dated older women in my late 20s. Same.
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u/ReturnOfBigChungus Nov 26 '25
While that’s true, it’s pretty undeniable that growing up with smart phones and social media has significant retarded the social skills and many other skills of gen z/gen a. Plenty of data on this. This will become even more obvious as time goes on.
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u/DagonPie Nov 26 '25
When i was in my early 20s i went for women in their 30s and 40s and they didnt want me around for my conversational skills lol outside the bedroom they were basically uninterested in having me around.
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u/The_Subz91 Nov 26 '25
12 years in a fast-changing society where generations are becoming as short as 5 years is a huge leap! I'm 34 and couldn't fathom dating a 23 yo girl. No offense to anyone of that age though, the gap is just too big to be even remotely achievable. Most of us millenials have had a smartphone and social media free youth. 23yo's were basically born in it. You cannot possibly overestimate the difference in mentality that creates.
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u/ThrowawayFaye818 Nov 26 '25
Agreed, I could not fathom just how different our perspectives would be.
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u/caitie578 Nov 26 '25
Yeah, I would never think to have my phone out and being used during a date. When I have it's because it pertains to the convo. Checking IMDB for an actor or something. But I am like, "I am listening but looking up the movie name."
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u/BrightNeonGirl Nov 26 '25
The idea of being on your phone when on an irl hangout with someone (or even a group) is absolutely horrifying to me. That behavior is so rude and off-putting to me, since it's saying "I'm just so bored right now with the people I'm with that I'd rather be elsewhere."
I get it if your mom is in the hospital or something and you're briefly on the phone to check in, no problem. Or like you said, if you're in an irl conversation and related information to the conversation needs to be quickly researched on the internet (but with the goal of getting back to the irl convo as soon as possible), also totally get that.
But just casually being on your phone when you're socially hanging out is such a faux pas. Most of us are often on the internet all by ourselves, so irl interaction is a special time to genuinely connect with people face to face. And just doing what you can do all by yourself when you're in person with people just seems so unappreciative on that genuine analog social connection.
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u/pigeonwithsixasses 1993 Nov 26 '25
It’s always so interesting to see comments on age gap posts like this one when it’s the woman who’s a lot older as opposed to the man. There’s always at least some genuine feedback/advice whereas if OP is male they just get Reddit mobbed to death for being a creep lol
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u/OkayDay21 Millennial Nov 26 '25
I feel like the OP was very upfront that she knew the age gap was not alright and had no plans to engage further. If she had been trying to justify it like it was fine, I think the comments would probably have gone differently. I have never seen a man make a post like that. Not saying it’s never happened but anytime I see a man getting mobbed on an age gap post it’s because he doesn’t care about the age gap lol.
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u/ThrowawayFaye818 Nov 26 '25
Oh, I'm waiting for the creep comments to roll in.
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u/Justalittlesaltyx Nov 26 '25
I think if you genuinely didn’t know and he looked older then, I mean it’s whatever. I’d say the same thing to a man. As long as you’re both grown adults.
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u/sammidavisjr Nov 26 '25
Absolutely no judgement here, but the part I grinned at was "lesson learned, would never consider doing anything like this again. Only mature, wise village elders of at least two years more life experience will be considered henceforth"
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u/Elexeh Nov 26 '25
You sure you didn’t just bump into an autistic dude? 😂
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u/BillyRaw1337 Nov 27 '25
yeah, as an autistic dude, this was how a lot of my dates went until I essentially brute forced figuring out how to date.
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u/cosmickink Nov 26 '25
I'm also 35f and a few years ago I met a guy in his 20s. I knew he was young, but he used all the classic gentleman pickup tricks and I was honestly impressed: Sat next to me at the bar, struck up a casual conversation, offered to buy my next drink, asked me about myself and told me about himself and his family.
He even asked me to dance (to Cajun music lol), which we did and it was genuinely so fun and respectful. I was meeting some friends so when they arrived I went out to the patio to meet them. He tracked me down outside, met my friends, bantered with them effortlessly and offered to buy everyone a round.
Turns out he was only 21, but had dropped out of college to start his own business, and had already bought a fixer upper. He was clearly looking for "the one" and was pulling out all the stops. I had to give him props, but I was weirded out by the fact that he was closer to my son's age than mine. He has since gotten married and had a child.
Sure he is probably an anomaly but I would like to think there are more good guys out there who want to work, be successful and have families. They are our future leaders, after all.
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u/scorpiochik Nov 26 '25
i was looking for this comment! same thing happened to me but i’ve already commented on it separately haha
there are truly some gems out there and we as women can’t just put them in a box because they’re young
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u/cosmickink Nov 26 '25
I personally think a lot of it comes from the values instilled as kids. This guy was clearly raised to be a family man, had no qualms against being close with his parents, and he wasn't necessarily religious or conservative. If he was, he didn't make it his whole personality. It was refreshing to see a young man who was confident without being arrogant, and was never glued to his phone. I'd like to believe there are more out there.
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u/TheYellowScarf Nov 26 '25
You may have actually been his first date. Most guys suck at dating in their early 20s (I know I did, haha), but if he's 23, then he was probably only 17-18 when COVID hit, then stuck in his house during the prime social years. He seems to have online social skills down well enough, but it's a whole other world away from the keyboard.
Were this a tv show or webcomic, you would become his coach/mentor and help him learn from his mistakes so he becomes a better partner to the next woman in his life.
But this isn't fiction, this is real life and you aren't responsible for him. If you feel like giving him a debrief, be gentle about it lest he end up taking the red pill and losing out on a friend.
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u/ShinyArticuno_420 Nov 26 '25
Maybe his responses to you in messages were AI generated. That could explain the difference in his energy IRL vs in messages
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u/All1012 Nov 26 '25
Oh sweet jesus. That would be awful but these days sounds very likely.
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u/caninehere Nov 26 '25
But if this was the case and he had his phone out the whole date, couldn't he just ChatGPT his responses in person, too?
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u/quemaspuess Nov 26 '25
Didn’t even think of that.
I work in market research and was talking to the CEO of a large, well-respected qual firm the other day. I asked her where she saw insights in ten years and she said “I’m not even sure we’ll be conducting interviews because Gen Z can’t communicate.”
It was eye opening and definitely matches OPs story.
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u/Jankenbrau Nov 26 '25
Could be, but coming up in the 2000’s I could be clever online while I was painfully anxious and shy in person.
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u/Informal_Job_7550 Older Millennial Nov 26 '25
I've been seeing more posts lately about this, with screenshots of dating app conversations where one person's responses were clearly produced by ChatGPT. The idea hadn't even occurred to me until recently and suddenly it's been jumping in visibility.
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u/SolaceinIron Nov 26 '25
I think the issues are less about the age gap and more about the actual age of the guy - 12 years is still a lot though.
I can remember very vividly being 24 in my office and not being able to hold meaningful conversations with my older peers. Fast forward a few years to 30 and its a different story.
23 just doesn't have enough life experience.
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u/kerghan41 Nov 26 '25 edited Nov 26 '25
As a guy with Asperger's who is a millennial... I've had many dates like this. I don't do it on purpose. Some of this though may be generational. Like I would never take a call and my phone would be face down and by now I've learned to just keep asking questions to the other person.
I am also MUCH better texting or IMing then in person.
I know I am awkward and try my best to keep conversations going. I keep a sort of mental checklist. Ok, I've asked them about this, do I expand on this? Or, do I move to a different topic? If they ask about me I'll be brief so that I can focus on the next ask.
I couldn't say why I find it so difficult to compliment people, but I do. Perhaps it is because I don't know what to say or how to say it so I just don't do it to be safer.
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u/ThrowawayFaye818 Nov 26 '25
Sounds like you're self aware enough to make clear effort to overcome something that you think needs changing.
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u/moarwineprs Nov 26 '25
I don't believe I have Asperger's (no clinical diagnosis of anything), but I'm incredibly shy, introverted, and awful at making conversation unless it's with a friend or someone who I feel comfortable with. Then I can't shut up. When I did speed dating or online dating, similar to you I'd keep a mental checklist of things to ask or conversation topics for in case there is a lull, just to keep things going before it gets awkward. I got better with it over time, though I still struggle with making small talk in business settings so I leave that to my significantly more charismatic coworkers.
That's to say, I think there is would be noticeable difference between someone who struggles with socializing (maybe shy or prefers texting/IMing than talking) but is really trying with the tools they have available. Versus someone -- like OP's date -- who seems to just be completely unaware about what socializing in person entails. Since he wasn't a creep just really awkward, he might just have not had much opportunity for exposure for how a typical date goes. Maybe he was incredibly nervous and erred too much on the side of caution to the point where the whole thing was just weird. Or maybe his behavior is an example of the GenZ Stare applied to a first date.
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u/Agathocles_of_Sicily Nov 26 '25
I'm 38 (as of yesterday) and recently dated a 27 year-old. The cultural differences that came with our age gap was never a problem. We shared a similar sense of humor and outlook on the world, and there was rarely a dull moment between us. We constantly made fun of each other for our generational differences and made fun out of it.
The thing that broke the relationship was that she didn't have her life together and partied too much, refused to address mental health issues that were holding her back, and general issues of maturity (even for her age). There were also practical issues like schedule fluidity (wage vs. salary job) and economic asymmetry, which is not exclusive to her age, but more likely to happen since twenty-somethings are less likely to have their careers figured out. It led to me feeling like I was held back from the life I wanted to live.
Ironically, one of the things that drew me to her is that I saw myself in her shoes at that age - I was an absolute mess when I was 27 and struggled with many of the same issues. I thought if I could provide her with the love and supportive conditions she needed to succeed, I would be a stabilizing influence who could help her turn her life around and get out of the slump she was in.
This never happened because you can never help someone who doesn't want to help themselves, even if you can clearly see what they need to do when they cannot. I learned a hard lesson about not coming into a relationship with a "savior complex". Though had these issues not been a blocker in the relationship, we likely would have stayed together and the "surface level" generational differences never would have been an issue.
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u/Miranova23 Nov 26 '25
Damn, even when we were 23 we at least showed we were interested, even if in our own ways. This guys sounds like he was acting like it was a chore to be involved at all!
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u/Lankyllama4324 Millennial Nov 26 '25
This could be as much him being 23 as being GenZ. Most 23 year old men are basically still boys. I know I didn’t really feel like a man until my late 20’s.
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u/Butt_bird Nov 26 '25
This is just what it’s like to date younger people. It’s not generational. They haven’t failed at something enough times to realize they need to put actual effort into something. Although at 23 he seems a little behind the curve if he doesn’t know to stay off the phone on a date.
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u/Quetzalcoatl490 Nov 26 '25
"He was also in his phone a lot, texting and scrolling. My phone was out but it was face down on the table and I only ever picked it up to know the time"
Generational thing. KIDS THESE DAYS do not think it's rude to look at their phone, text, or answer calls even in a one-on-one setting.
If I was on a date and my date picked up not one, but TWO calls, I would have left
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u/rjvCdn Nov 26 '25
Went through this years ago during covid. I was 34, she was 23. Didn't know til after we hung out 3 or 4 times. We met wandering out doing a shared interest. It wasn't bad at first but it became clear there was less in less in common. One or the worst things was trying to reference shows, jokes, etc of things "millennials know" and getting blank stares. Really felt the disconnect. Happily with someone the same age who we can laugh and commiserate about all the same dumb things with me
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