The Modern Man has an iPhone 6 Plus and goes to Coachella every year. He’s thinking about starting a blog and has been “like really into standup lately.” He has a favorite microbrewery because he likes his beer really hoppy, whatever that means. He has a fun Twitter feed and interesting theories about what could happen on “House of Cards.”
Peter had all the makings of a Modern Man. His Twitter feed was super-witty. He drank only local beer. He owned one of those weed pen vapor things. He wore cardigans and insisted on managing the music at every party, saying, “Trust me, you’ll see this artist on the Coachella lineup in two years.”
Peter was funny, cultured, well dressed and well read, and I took pride in dating a guy who was so keenly cool. But like most modern men, when confronted after weeks of sleeping together with mild inquiries regarding commitment, he crumbled. The Modern Man is “just not into labels” and is “only trying to have some fun.”
When I asked Peter what that was supposed to mean, he said, “Chill.”
Yet “chill” I did not.
Later, I met a friend for lunch. “Peter and I broke up,” I announced.
“Were you guys together?” she asked.
“Well, we’d been seeing each other for a few weeks.”
“Yeah, but it wasn’t on Facebook,” she said. “It’s only real if it’s on Facebook.”
I was devastated when Peter and I stopped seeing each other, except for the fact that when we stopped seeing each other, we couldn’t stop seeing each other, because we followed each other on Twitter and Instagram and were friends on Facebook. So I saw him all the time, his grinning profile picture shadowing my feed.
“Unfollow him!” my friends would roar. “You’re never going to get over him unless you unfollow him on all that stuff.”
But I couldn’t. There was something so enthralling about being able to track his social life. Was he seeing someone else? I had to know. Besides, unfollowing him was too dramatic, as if I were proclaiming, “I can’t handle this!” Remaining friends on social media, however, showed I was unfazed, cool, “chill” and whatever.
But I wasn’t any of those things. I’d find myself scrolling through his tweets and Instagram posts, which included photos of other women. I’d shove my phone into my friends’ faces, their noses practically fogging the screen, and ask, “Is she prettier than me?”
One night, drunk at 2 a.m., I was trying to decipher if an innocuous Drake lyric he tweeted could somehow be directed at me as a possible admission of affection. Sensing the craziness of that, I clicked “unfollow” and then “unfriend.” With this tiny act of defiance, I was finally free. “This is closure,” I told myself. “This is moving on.”
After that splash of romantic failure, I remembered the wisdom of George Costanza. In a classic episode of “Seinfeld” (are there any nonclassic episodes?), George, in realizing that his life is a failure, decides he should do the opposite of what he normally does, reasoning that if every instinct he has is wrong, the opposite must be right.
With this in mind, I decided to swear off modern men. No more Twitter games. No more Instagram dissections. No more Facebook predation. I wanted someone mature.
Peter had all the makings of a Modern Man. His Twitter feed was super-witty. He drank only local beer. He owned one of those weed pen vapor things. He wore cardigans and insisted on managing the music at every party, saying, “Trust me, you’ll see this artist on the Coachella lineup in two years.”
Peter was funny, cultured, well dressed and well read, and I took pride in dating a guy who was so keenly cool. But like most modern men, when confronted after weeks of sleeping together with mild inquiries regarding commitment, he crumbled. The Modern Man is “just not into labels” and is “only trying to have some fun.”When I asked Peter what that was supposed to mean, he said, “Chill.”
Yet “chill” I did not.
Later, I met a friend for lunch. “Peter and I broke up,” I announced.
“Were you guys together?” she asked.
“Well, we’d been seeing each other for a few weeks.”
“Yeah, but it wasn’t on Facebook,” she said. “It’s only real if it’s on Facebook.”
I was devastated when Peter and I stopped seeing each other, except for the fact that when we stopped seeing each other, we couldn’t stop seeing each other, because we followed each other on Twitter and Instagram and were friends on Facebook. So I saw him all the time, his grinning profile picture shadowing my feed.
“Unfollow him!” my friends would roar. “You’re never going to get over him unless you unfollow him on all that stuff.”
But I couldn’t. There was something so enthralling about being able to track his social life. Was he seeing someone else? I had to know. Besides, unfollowing him was too dramatic, as if I were proclaiming, “I can’t handle this!” Remaining friends on social media, however, showed I was unfazed, cool, “chill” and whatever.
But I wasn’t any of those things. I’d find myself scrolling through his tweets and Instagram posts, which included photos of other women. I’d shove my phone into my friends’ faces, their noses practically fogging the screen, and ask, “Is she prettier than me?”
One night, drunk at 2 a.m., I was trying to decipher if an innocuous Drake lyric he tweeted could somehow be directed at me as a possible admission of affection. Sensing the craziness of that, I clicked “unfollow” and then “unfriend.” With this tiny act of defiance, I was finally free. “This is closure,” I told myself. “This is moving on.”
After that splash of romantic failure, I remembered the wisdom of George Costanza. In a classic episode of “Seinfeld” (are there any nonclassic episodes?), George, in realizing that his life is a failure, decides he should do the opposite of what he normally does, reasoning that if every instinct he has is wrong, the opposite must be right.
With this in mind, I decided to swear off modern men. No more Twitter games. No more Instagram dissections. No more Facebook predation. I wanted someone mature.
by Jochebed Smith, NY Times | Read more:
Image: Brian Rea
