Meet scoot: the delights and drama of dating in midlife

Dating is fraught at any age. The addition of the existence of children, societal disapproval and the burden of past relationships make midlife dating a bumpy and difficult road

When the first person in my building died, I decided I would go on a date. It was March 2021 and COVID-19’s deadly Delta wave was beginning its rampage in Delhi-NCR. My long-term partner and I had had a falling out a few months prior, and when it began to feel like the world itself was ending, I decided I’d rather go out guns blazing than heartbroken and moping in a corner of my house. I matched with this person online and we decided to meet at an open-air restaurant near my house.

My date was on time, we found a table, and immediately we realised there was a thousand things we could talk about. We were there for some four hours and we’d barely scratched the surface of the things we had in common. It was splendid, and I recognised that it was special. It seemed too good to risk a romantic misadventure, and so the perfect date became one of my best friends. I was ill these last couple of weeks and it was the date who was taking me to doctor’s appointments, bringing me medicines and checking on me every evening. We speak often, we meet less often, we discuss his dating life endlessly. Our children are friends, we are always planning a holiday. But not everyone is so lucky.

Dating is never easy, a process fraught with deception and doubt, and dating in your midlife is even worse. Anyone who has got thus far is a veteran of previous relationships and a survivor of at least one nasty break-up. Added to this often is the existence of children, yours and theirs, the disapproval of friends and family, and a general sense of world weariness. And I have not even begun to talk about the creeps and weirdos out there.

In the five years that she dated, Mini Hinduja (name changed) found herself in so many strange situations that she has documented them so as not to forget. At 43, when a serious long-term relationship ended, Hinduja, who is a senior corporate professional, decided to dip her toe in the online dating world. Her modus operandi was to arrange the first meeting at a bar she was familiar with, where the staff knew her and so she considered it a safe space.

One of the first dates she went on, the guy immediately launched into a long description of a strange fantasy of his to dress up his dates in elaborate silver jewellery. “He kept talking about the jangle of the bangles, even the barman burst out laughing,” Hinduja says, “and I decided if I wrote a book about this, the chapter would be called ‘The Jangle of Bangles’.” But her biggest pet peeve was men who would meet her on dates and then use that in order to seek help to further their careers. “Once they knew who I was, they’d send me their résumés, or ask if I could help connect them to this senior executive or the other. I mean, we met on a date, for god’s sake, my job is not to further your career prospects after that.”

Past life is the problem in midlife dating. Scrolling through her dating notes, Hinduja finds another candidate for the worst date hall of fame. “This person kept asking me what my vision was. Like in a job interview. And then he went on to berate his former girlfriend for not having a vision. She wanted to be a fashion designer, he told me, but did not have the vision for it, so she was just a tailor. He gave me a series of situations she got into and asked me what my response under similar circumstances would have been. It was so bizarre, and in retrospect, very comical,” she says.

Since Hinduja does not have kids, she was at least spared the complexities of dating as a single parent. In Gurugram, 48-year-old Mani Singh is raising two daughters. Initially he was reluctant to date seriously because his girls were young, and he didn’t want to complicate their lives. A friend of his had “made the mistake” of introducing his girlfriend to his daughter, and the two of them got along very well. So, eventually, when the relationship didn’t work, his daughter was devastated a second time around. But now that Singh’s daughters are older, he is interested in finding someone for the longer term.