No matter how swimmingly a first date is going -- you're fantasizing about the giant ring that you will photograph with your Blackberry and bbm to 58 of your closest friends, the wedding at the Ritz that makes the Kushners look like they were on a tight budget, and your three children who will cause endless trips to Costco for 6-packs of deck chairs and an 84-ounce tub of hoisin sauce -- there is always one guaranteed moment of awkwardness: paying.
Who pays? Should I offer to pay? Should I let you pay? Should I pretend to fake offer to pay and then if he makes me I will be offended? Should I do the little dance where I reach for my purse and go oh wait I've got it (but not really my purse isn't even over there its sitting on my lap?)
I can't figure out how guys want girls to react about this. I was recently fried by a JDater for not offering to help pay. (This was after the date, because had he said this during, I might have ever so gently knocked my knee against his kosher pickle). He said he wasn't going to let me anyway, but it would have been nice for me to offer (I know, ouch.)
I always feel awkward when the check comes and turn red and want to melt into the tablecloth so I've decided to just be gracious and thank my date, letting him pay. (For FIRST dates, the subsequent ones are a whole other ballpark.)
Is this wrong?
Does the amount of money matter too? If it's dinner for a first date instead of drinks, does that make it more wrong to not offer? Or is it just on principle? I have a lot of questions.
For most of these first dates, it's just some drinks. Because let's be real, the last thing you want is to be stuck at a four-course meal with some guy who literally has the personality of a potted plant with severe social anxiety and a crippling phobia of public places.
I personally am all for women being extremely independent, self-sufficient, and strong. Yet somehow I feel that it is not the woman's responsibility to cover the first date.
What say ye, readers?