Online Dating in the Age of COVID-19 May Just Bring Back Romance

Whether you’ve been separated from your loved ones, found yourself plunged into self-quarantine with the someone you just met on Bumble, are single and navigating a whole new world of virtual dating, or are ready to call in the divorce lawyers after finding yourself in far too close proximity to your partner, the rapid spread of COVID-19 has reshaped our relationships drastically. So what is it really like to Love in the Time of Coronavirus?

If you’ve ever seen the film Becoming Jane, then you remember the steamy courtship scene when James McAvoy steps in to dance with Anne Hathaway. I was a sophomore in high school when this movie came out, and although I had experienced the true deliciousness of David Bowie in The Labyrinth and Patrick Swayze in Dirty Dancing by this point, it was the romance between Jane Austen (Hathaway) and Thomas Lefroy (McAvoy) that made me clutch my chest and hold my breath. I mean, wow. I’m not old-fashioned by any means, but there was something about the way Austen and Lefroy’s romance blossomed and burned—slowly, delicately, with soulful glances, brushes of the hand and the steady exchange of words—that made me think, even at the age of 16, “I want that someday.”

Well, I haven’t found it, and maybe you haven’t either, but this isn’t because our standards are too high, no matter what Stephen with a ph from Tinder thinks. Dating is different now. In the age of social media and online dating, when anyone and anything is at our fingertips, a gal is lucky to get a “How’s it going?” before a pic of some guy’s eggplant emoji. These are dark times. Where’s the romance? Where’s the space to take time to actually get to know a person before you meet them at 11 p.m. at a bar? Where’s James McAvoy in period costume?

A year and a half ago when I re-entered the dating app scene after a monumental break-up that had me, how do you say, shooketh, I found myself constantly wondering what the rush was to meet in person after establishing a match. On a regular basis, I would send a message that said something like, “I prefer to get to know people a little better before meeting them.” Sometimes that request was met with respect and continued conversation, and other times, it was left unanswered, which showed me that we wanted different things. That, or the person just sincerely didn’t want to talk to me and wanted to meet in person to have a staring contest instead (I’d win, by the way).

I’m sure none of us who binged Love Is Blind a few weeks ago, before the world took the horrific onset of coronavirus seriously, thought that we too would soon be isolated in pods and having to rely on communication behind closed doors to get to know a person, but here we are. In the current climate of social distancing, we really shouldn’t be meeting Bumble matches for in-person dates. It’s just not the time. In the words of Ms. Austen—which really should be all of our mottos for the time being as we ride out this pandemic—“Ah! There is nothing like staying at home, for real comfort. Nobody can be more devoted to home than I am.”

I get how crucial in-person chemistry is to how a relationship will pan out. However, it’s intriguing to me how many men I’ve come across who, in two messages or less, are willing to put on pants, leave their homes, get into their cars, and drive to a place to meet a total stranger without knowing a single thing about them. Don’t you want to know what I’m looking for, Tyler? Don’t you want to know what my job is, or if I have goals, or my thoughts on climate change?!

Aside from craving the delicious witty repartee of an Austen novel, I as a woman have many things to consider when it comes to meeting someone for the first time: Will it be safe? Can we meet in a public place? Is this person going to murder me? Slowing our rolls to have a little conversation first wouldn’t kill us. And suddenly we all have a lot of social-distance-supported time to do just that.

So what would Jane Austen do? I’ll tell you: She would take a seat at her desk, bust out her quill, and she’d write a banging letter to the person who has her heart.

It would take literally days for them to receive the letter, read the letter, write their response, and send it back. Because, you know, they didn’t have text or email back then and had to do a lot of things by horse-drawn carriage and on foot, and we all know how excruciating it is to wait for those three little typing dots in today’s world, so can you imagine what it must have been like back then?! But they still did it! They put it all on the line for love.

I don’t know about you, but the idea of falling in love or establishing a connection through the written word—even if it’s not so much handwritten letters as texts on What’s App—sounds pretty damn romantic to me. I experienced this a few weeks ago before quarantine and guess what? We’re no longer talking, because, turns out, we have different views on voting. Which I discovered via text! I saved myself putting on pants, getting in my car, and driving to a place to meet a total stranger.

Slow down, get to know someone, ask them questions, and discover who they are. Fire up the dating apps, play twenty questions with your crush, plan a virtual happy hour or FaceTime while disinfecting your homes together. Or if you’re currently dating someone at a responsible social distance, set aside time for text or phone conversations to keep the spark alive. You’d be surprised at how close you can get to a person this way, and how much chemistry can build over time—Austen-style.

Or if you’re me, you can draft a viral tweet about dating at a social distance and have people from all over the world writing poems to one another.

Romance isn’t dead. I was reminded of that this week. But, like many other things, it very well could slip away, so it’s up to us to hold onto it. And how lucky are we that we can do that from the comfort of our own couch?

Kaitlyn McQuin is a writer, actor, and comedian living in New Orleans. To see what she’s up to, visit her website or follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

Do you have a story about love in the time of the coronavirus? Tell us by sending a voice memo or written message to love@glamour.com.

Originally Appeared on Glamour