Baby, it might be cold outside, but I’d rather freeze than get back on that dating carousel
This cuffing season, I won’t be back on the dating apps hoping to luck out on my very own future mayor. But I will be choosing friends and family over winter isolation
The internet can’t decide how we’re supposed to feel about connection. One week, Vogue insists it’s “embarrassing to have a boyfriend”. The next, everyone’s spiralling on TikTok about missing “cuffing season”, as if being single once the air chills is some kind of executive failure. The heart-shaped pendulum swings between ironic detachment and desperate intimacy. It must be winter.
And so it begins. The race to partner up with the first acceptable warm body heats up. Perhaps a biological response to the drop in temperature. Or a clever cost-cutting measure against rising energy bills. Whatever the reason, the soft launch is inevitable. Social media feeds steadily fill with hints of fresh couples. Posts tease the presence of a new beau, an advent calendar revealing different limbs and appendages until blurry confirmation on Christmas Day. An approach meant to be read as casual, yet executed with all the finesse of a Sydney Sweeney pap walk.
I’m not saying I can’t relate. I’m more than familiar with the cramps that come from having a foot in both camps — veering wildly between “leave me alone” to “marry me” depending on the mood. In fact, for a brief, delusional moment, I nearly redownloaded Hinge after purging it from my phone (again). Rumour has it that New York’s mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani and chic artist Rama Duwaji swiped themselves right into a modern love story. An iconic brown power couple igniting false hope in single desi girls everywhere.
The pull was strong, but maybe I was just buoyed by Mamdani’s historic win. A faint light flickering in the dark hallway of democracy, a sense of long-overdue victory sending my hormones temporarily into overdrive. Was this cute couple my sign to persevere through tedious conversations and microaggressions from men who don’t even seem to like women? Could a few swipes end my winter of discontent?
I think not. Baby, it might be cold outside, but I’ve decided I’d rather freeze than get back on that dating carousel.
Of course, people must still meet in real life, but that would require putting myself out there. While winter sweeps singles into situationships, my instinct is to disappear entirely, making romance the least of my problems. I’m too busy ghosting my friends to worry about being ghosted by men.
When the clocks go back, something in me shuts down. A hibernation mode is triggered and the only company I seek comes in the form of a Sad lamp. Without realising, I quietly erase myself from the social calendar and it isn’t until my eyebrows have met in the middle that I note how much time has passed.
Hiding away has never been a conscious decision, but every winter I become the flaky friend. I’m not proud of it. A cancelled coffee here, a postponed dinner there. The most concerning part is how comfortable isolation can feel at times, cocooned in creature comforts, letting books and films stand in as a proxy for human connection. Before you realise it, your entire world has shrunk to the size of your living room.
When I finally emerge, I’m overwhelmed by the small acts of care and kindness shown by my loved ones. Arriving late to meet my favourite cousin, drenched and apologetic, only to find my coffee already waiting exactly how I like it. Or the friends who text, “Would love to see you when you’re up to it,” without a trace of resentment. Faces that light up when I walk into the room.
I find myself learning the same lesson over and over again: that the only tonic that truly nourishes me is people. The friends and family who act like lighthouses when I start drifting out too far. And maybe sometimes I forget I’m a lighthouse for them too. Holing up the dark might feel like self-preservation, but it’s not self-care. It might even be a little selfish.
This winter I’m determined it will be different. Maybe it was Mamdani’s win after all. A reminder that showing up actually matters. I can’t curate a love life worth posting about online or magic up a boyfriend to be embarrassed about, but I can treat connection as something to nurture, not earn.
So this cuffing season, I won’t be back on the dating apps hoping to luck out on my very own future mayor. But I will be outside choosing people over passive isolation. I’ll show up for my friends and their festivities — even if my social stamina is currently as weak as my romantic prospects.
Unless the event is too loud or starts after 11pm. Be reasonable.
