Date Night

For my bending social norms project, I employed my boyfriend for a night out. I told him that I would assume the "male" role on the date and he would assume the "female" role for the night. We both got dressed up, I even stopped and got him red roses (which he refused to bring with). I drove us to dinner, opening the car door and restaurant, I even went as far as too pull out his chair for him.

I should mention, that this is already out of the norm for us. We have never taken on the "traditional gender norms" of a chivalrous gentleman and the perfect lady. I have never expected him to open all of my doors and pay for all my food, and he has never expected me constantly flatter him to keep him happy. Neither of us have a problem with me taking charge in the relationship on occasion, I tell him when I want a date night, and I don't mind paying for it.

For this date night, I was trying my best to take on the role of the man in the relationship. I order his drinks and food for him, after he told me what he wanted, I was not going to just assume what he wanted.

For dinner, we chose Ichiban, which has a bar like area that over looks the two cooks. We sat there, hoping it would get us the most reactions. No one seemed to look twice when I pulled out his chair or ordered his food. Sot it was time to go a little overboard. A man, about our age, sat down a few seats from us at the bar, and apparently that gave my boyfriend, Andrew an idea. (He was more in this for the theatrics than the study of other people.) He very loudly accused me of "wandering eyes" and demanded to know why I was looking at another man. He went so far as to fake a break in his voice. If the young man at the end of the bar heard us, he didn't react.

Andrew tried to start another stereotyped fight, but to be completely honest I was too uncomfortable to. It wasn't something that was normal for us. We are both adults that are more than capable for speaking for ourselves.

I was surprised by how uncomfortable I was by the whole experiment, I had gone into it believing that we would be making everyone else uncomfortable. We aren't the couple that is wholly dependent on each other and must let the other know what is going on 24/7, or where we are at all times. And we don't worry about trivial things, like glancing at someone else. It's safe to say, we are not a traditional gender roles couple.