Times have changed.

Back in the day, guys were not only expected to be the bread winner, they were expected to be a respectful man with good manners. Think Leave It to Beaver era for a second—a guy asks a girl to dinner. He goes to her house to pick her up but he doesn’t just honk the horn, he goes to the front door and gets her, then opens her car door and off they go. Upon arriving at the restaurant, he again opens her car door, then opens the door to the venue, then pulls out her chair. He lets her order first and at the end of the night, he pays the bill, takes her home at a reasonable time, again opens her car door and walks her to the front door where the two say their farewells. Now, fast forward to today—a guy asks a girl to go Dingus, he says “see you there”, and then expects you to find your own way there with your own group of friends. Or, a guy texts a girl, asks her to dinner, texts her when he is outside, opens the restaurant door, doesn’t pull her chair out, doesn’t let her order first, pays the bill, then drops her back off at her house with a simple, “I’ll text you later.” What has happened over the years?

Personally, I couldn’t tell you the last time I was actually asked out on a date. I’ve been asked to sit at someone’s house and watch football or a movie, but never have I honestly been asked to dinner. It’s a shame really. Do I blame it on being in college? No, not so much, because I hear friends talk about so-and-so asked them on a lunch date and the voice inside my head always says, “why doesn’t anyone ever ask me to lunch?” Am I looking in the wrong places? Do I have “DON’T ASK ME ON A DATE” stamped across my forehead? If I do, it must be in invisible ink because I didn’t see it when I put my make-up on this morning. Do I give off this vibe that I’m unaware of?

Guys’ role in the world isn’t the same as before. They are no longer expected to be the bread winner. Women now work just as hard as men and sometimes have higher paying jobs and in the end, are the bread winner. Guys don’t call girls anymore, they text them. Guys think it’s more than acceptable to not spend any money on a girl, like going out on a date or to a movie.  Doing gentlemanly things for a girl is a sign of respect for the girl and if you were raised right, you don’t think twice about doing them.

I’m guilty of not expecting a guy to ask me on a date or call me. I’ve been somewhat content with hanging out watching a movie or texting. However, now that I’ve gotten older and want more out of things, I’ve started to see that settling for a couch date and a text has set myself up for disaster. After hanging out once or twice, I have mentioned going to eat or something simple and the guy that I was hanging out with didn’t understand what was wrong with the way things were and instead of realizing that they weren’t fully respecting me, I pushed it aside and let things continue down the same path. I have skipped my ass down this path one too many times, and it’s getting old. Actually, it is old. I’m 22 years old and by God, I want to be asked on a date. Life of a singleton is never easy and it has its perks, but when other singletons around you are living the single life up with dates here and there with different guys all the time, I start to wonder… Am I doomed for the single life? We shall see.

What I do know is this… if I don’t get respect right off the bat, I’m done. It isn’t fair to myself to continue skipping down the same path as before.