What happened to romance?
please, just a crumb 🥺🤲🏾
January was awash with all of the “new year, new me” levelling up, locking in, becoming THAT girl and I have to say I’m glad to see the back of it. I got sucked into the health and wellness of it all (especially now that I have an Apple Watch and became Team Close Your Rings) but so much of this month felt cold and hard.
Endless darkness stretches out before me and in London you never catch a break from the grey cloud that encompasses you. I just need warmth.
I closed out December with a chaotic 2024 Dating Wrapped that honestly left me questioning my own sense of self more than the behaviours of any man I had the misfortune of encountering. But then I opened Hinge.
Now, if you know anything about me, I’ve spoken at length about how much I hate Hinge and how it’s ultimately segregation in app form.
But while I was at home in Virginia for the holidays with my friend Izzy, I got sucked back in.
She was curious to see what the men of Virginia were like, and honestly who could blame her. I’ve often thought of the differences between American and British men and I can safely say there’s at least a stark difference in look.
I deleted all of my dating apps before setting foot on the plane home, a ritual I’ve done now for the past two years, finding myself utterly exhausted, drained and bewildered by dating. Running to the safety of home for Christmas for everything (work, societal downfall, dating) it means that I’m on hiatus.
Just before I left, I was feeling particularly fed up and I was dealing with an injury that meant that I was put on bed rest so had to hang up my jersey for the season earlier than expected. But that brings me back to dating in Virginia…
Admittedly now that I’ve lived in London for the past 14 years, my experience of dating American men has dwindled (I’d go so far to admit that I almost actively avoid them) but as she was going through them on her Hinge we saw someone who immediately caught my eye. So I instantly redownload that stupid app to try and match with him, and of course, thanks to Hinge’s algorithm, I couldn’t find him.
Instead, I ended up matching with someone else who actually ended up being, dare I say, exactly the type of man I’m looking for — and a total breath of fresh air in the noxious gas of the dating atmosphere that I needed.
We went out for dinner on Christmas Eve Eve, which while very low-key and casual still felt very romantic given the time of year.
He was handsome! And smart! And interesting! And interested! He reminded me of what it felt like to be on a date with someone and enjoy myself, not just because I enjoy my own company. He was polite, generous, kind, and an absolute joy to be around.
He was loving, in the way that he spoke about his last partner and her children. It was truly a sight to behold, and I almost resent making such a big deal of it because it should be standard practice. I should encounter men like this more often, but instead it was like seeing the Northern Lights and I was just in awe.
There can be a bitterness that you sense in people who are exhausted from dating. People who are older, people who have been married and are now divorced. But he was the total opposite. You rarely see a genuine happiness reflected back at you these days.
We had one last date before I had to fly back to London and in the month that’s since passed it feels as though I dreamed up this person.
We left it on a really positive note — no empty promises or attempts at keeping up daily conversation despite me being back in London and him across the Atlantic. Long distance is hard enough, you really have to want to make it work, and it was just so early in our meeting I think we both knew it would end up fizzling out if we tried to just keep talking for the sake of it.
Every now and then I think, “I should text him” but I don’t because…well, you know. If you’ve dated fruitlessly over the past few years then you know what I mean without me having to tell you.
The dates with other men that followed have gone back to the same dreadful, banal, chaotic blend of what it means to be a single woman getting closer to her 40s than being in her 30s. But we’ll get to those later, I don’t doubt.
It’s what’s lead me here, to my own little corner of the Internet once more, get out of my own head and down onto the page.
I went for coffee with one of my friends a few weeks ago, regaling her with the latest of men that I’m speaking to. Who has actually made plans, who I’ve seen and want to see again, who’s dropped off the face of the Earth and after being bored to tears by the sound of my own voice, I just blurted out: “What happened to romance?”
I feel like I’m absolutely starving for it. The way cinema has gotten seemingly more horny over the years, I’ve become horny for romance. For the yearning. For the earnestness. For sweet gestures. For consideration. For warmth.
The last time I spoke to my therapist, I told her about my fear of becoming closed off. I feel my walls going up and a hardening of my spirit that I’m just not used to.
And as she always does, she reminds me how my vulnerability is a strength, how my capacity for love, my capacity for giving and receiving it is not only a powerful thing but deeply human. It’s the way it should be.
So that’s the shift — I’ve pledged to bring back the romance into my everyday life, and what better time than the month of love?
I suppose we can call it a relaunch. A comeback, of sorts. A move away from what was The Noteworthy to be a new home for love.
I wanted to call it A Crumb of Romance for this very reason, as a perpetual hopeful romantic, a lover girl, and a sensitive soul but mostly because we need a little love, beauty, sensitivity and compassion day-to-day.
Ultimately that’s what you will find here now, I’ll be sharing my own musings as usual but I’ll be interviewing other people for their perspective on love. I’ll be getting into what they find romantic, what their last relationships taught them, and what they’re doing to bring romance back.
All types of people: single, married, divorced, straight, queer, monogamous, polyamorous…
And naturally, all types of love: romantic, platonic, familial… because there is no one way to have love in your life.
About me: I'm Nicole, the writer of A Crumb of Romance. I’m the co-author of The Half of It: Exploring the Mixed-Race Experience, a content creator and the co-host of the award-winning Mixed Up podcast. Having been chronically online since the age of 13, you can also find me on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and Pinterest.