Jacqui and I had gone to the eight-minute speed-dating that Nita at Roger Coaster's office had told me about and I'd got three matches: a handsome interesting architect; a red-haired baker from Queens who wasn't a looker but was very nice; and a young bartender who said words like "dude" and "shibby". Each had submitted a request for a date and I'd agreed to all three.
But before you start thinking a) that I'm a three-timing slut (and it's actually four because I haven't told you yet about the blind date Teenie had set up for me), or b) that the whole thing was a recipe for disaster - that I was bound to be caught out and end up with no one, let me explain the rules of Dating in New York City, especially the whole exclusive/non-exclusive end of things. What I was currently doing was Dating Non-exclusively - a perfectly acceptable state of affairs.
How it is in Ireland, is people just drift into relationships. You start by going for a couple of drinks, then on another night you might go to a film, then you run into each other at a party given by a mutual friend ad at some stage you start sleeping together - probably this night, in fact. (Sod's law: woman not in best underwear, etc.) It's all very casual and drifty and most of the initial propulsion depends on accidental meetings. But although no one ever says anything about exclusiveness or non-exclusiveness, he's definitely your boyfriend. So if you discovered the man you've been sharing fireside nights and videos with for the last few months having a nice dinner with a woman who wasn't a) you, b) a female relation of his, you'd be perfectly within your rights to pour a glass of wine over him and to tell the other woman that she's 'welcome to him'. It is also appropriate at this point to wiggle your little finger and say, 'Hardly worth it, though, is it?'
But not in New York. In NYC, you'd think: There's one of the men I've been seeing non-exclusively, having dinner with a woman he's also seeing non-exclusively. How civilized we all are... No wine gets poured on anyone, in fact you might even join them for a drink. (Actually, no, scratch that, I don't really think you would. Maybe on paper, but not in reality, especially if you liked him.)
However, it's an ill wind and during this time of non-exclusivity you can ride rings around yourself; you can sleep with a different man every night shoud you so wish and no one can call you a six-timing tramp.
