The Dilemma of Regional Dating
Interview by Alice Armitage Image by Dimity Cole
If you have ever found yourself single and living in regional Australia, you know dating isn’t for the faint of heart. I haven’t been able to find someone who accidentally swiped right on their weird cousin throughout my research for this interview series, but five brave individuals have shared some cracking stories about their dating escapades and some first hand insights on why it’s so bloody hard to navigate dating in the middle of nowhere – in case it wasn’t already a little bit obvious.
“I’ve been chasing women for years but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a desire to find someone to be with, to have a relationship like the one my parents have. It’s hard to be vulnerable and to put yourself out there for something real.”
John | 22
What can you tell me about yourself that won’t give away all of your secrets? I’ve been living in the Kimberley for the last four years on a remote cattle station. I’m not quite sure what else there is to tell you.
It seems that up north there is one golden dating rule – don’t screw the crew. What do you think about that? I got told this when I first started working up here. It was drilled into us and for good reason, if you go there, it gets very uncomfortable very quickly – not just for the two people involved but for everyone else as well. I learnt that first hand, unfortunately. You all live on top of each other in a station and there is no escaping. You live together, work together, eat together – every waking hour of the day you’re together. If you start sleeping with someone, it gets very awkward for you and for everyone else. I’ve learnt that first hand unfortunately.
How did you let that happen? There are lots of good reasons why it’s a good rule, but if you don’t date the people you work with, how else are you ever going to meet people? Being on the station is our whole life ...
You might go home for six weeks over the wet season, get to a couple of campdrafts in the winter but that’s about it. How are any of us supposed to find a long-term partner? If you do happen to find someone at one of those events, chances are you’ll be in a long distance relationship. I got to the point where it felt like there were no other options left.
It makes dating almost impossible right? Because you’re just so isolated. Yeah, where I was based last year we were six hours from any town and there were six other people living on the property.
I bet you get to know those people very well. Far too well, but you also build really strong relationships with them all. When you work so closely together you genuinely get to know each other, especially when you’ve been getting to know that person for three years. It’s easy to develop feelings for someone over that time, they don’t just feel like the crew anymore.
It seems like dating in super remote areas has this weird juxtaposition. Like if you’re dating someone you work with it’s too much and if you’re dating someone you don’t work with it’s not enough? Totally! There is no in-between. You’re either living on top of someone else or you only see them four times a year! It’s almost not even real, like you lose your grip on reality a bit. When you’re living remotely on a station there is just no middle ground.
So you started dating someone you worked with? Yep, for a few months. At the start it was great, you’ve
got your rose coloured glasses on and it all feels perfect, but after a while you naturally start asking each other if it’s going to work out – if it’s going to turn into something long-lasting. When you’re going through that it can get very intense very quickly. There is no way to take space and decide how you feel about anything. No way to get perspective. You just live in this very small bubble and the bubble can get toxic real fast.
I do want to talk about power imbalance. In an industry and a culture that’s super male dominated, I would imagine when a chick is hooking up with someone else in the crew, chances are there’s a power imbalance and she’s likely to be the one that’s worse off afterwards. I don’t want this to turn into a feminist essay but it would be crazy not to talk about it. In my situation we were pretty much on par when it came to the pecking order of things but you’re right, that’s not usually the case and women do come off worse most of the time. Maintaining professionalism is the toughest thing, I think. When you know someone intimately, you naturally behave differently. You talk back to each other and maybe don’t show as much respect towards each other as you should. But in tight-knit crews people get resentful of that very quickly.
What do you think was the most challenging aspect of this kind of relationship dynamic for you? It’s particularly hard when you are seeing someone that you live and work with for a period of time, in my case it was a few months not just a one off thing. Ultimately she did nothing wrong and I did nothing wrong, it just wasn’t going to work out. You’ve still got to face each other everyday and hope it will iron itself out overtime, but those first couple of weeks are obviously really hard. Normally you’d be able to keep your distance from that person for a while, so you can both move on – but instead that person is right in front of you everyday.
Lucy | 38
What has your experience been like dating in regional Australia? I was married very young, I was twenty-two and thrown back on the dating scene after divorce when I was thirty. I was a single mum, living in a small country town. I work in agriculture so my working life and social life are all around the same people.
I can’t even begin to imagine how you would navigate dating with all those dynamics. I hadn’t been in a great relationship previously, so I was in a period of my life where I was trying to find myself again, which involved dating. It also meant making plenty of poor decisions.
How were you meeting people? Were you on the apps? Of course, I was! Although I never really went on many dates. The only people I ended up seeing were people I already knew that I matched with, so it seemed like we should grab a drink. I had never gone on a date with a stranger ... well, until I did.
How did that go? I matched with this guy and it was also back in the day when your profile was linked to your Facebook account and you could see how many mutual friends you had. I told myself I just wanted to find a nice bloke who was just like one of my mates. I could see he was friends with a lot of my mates, so I guessed he couldn’t have been too bad.
Almost like a good reference for him. Exactly, so I was proactive and sent him a message – something super impressive like “How are you going?”. We chatted for a while and he had a great sense of humour, but like most farmers, he was pretty busy. We were keen to catch up but hadn’t really made any concrete plans. Then he invited me to his family’s stud bull sale and field day.
That’s one hell of a first date proposal! The night before I’d been out for a couple of drinks with my friends, so I was feeling a little courageous and sent him a message that I’d decided to come along. I wasn’t really interested in cows, but I thought I might at least get a decent steak sandwich out of it. So I got in the car and drove the hour and a half to his place.
That’s very brave of you! I gave myself a ‘three beer rule’ – if it wasn’t going well after three beers, I was just going to drive myself home. If that was the worst that could happen, it definitely wouldn’t be the end of the world.
And how did it go? I turned up late and there were maybe fifty people there. I just stood around for a bit looking because I’d never met this bloke before. I was on a Tinder date with a guy in his parents’ backyard. I met his parents, his brother and sister- in-law, his nieces and nephews, and friends of the family. We all ended up having dinner at his parents’ and that was it. We’ve been together ever since.
This story re-ignites my confidence that it’s possible to find someone in the country! But why do you think dating regionally is so difficult? I think there is a bad gender dynamic. Country boys seem to be lazy and not make much of an effort, so women have to be proactive. It’s also hard to literally meet new people. There are only so many people in your age range within a five-hundred-kilometre radius. I had the added caveat of being a single mum and understandably that’s not for everyone.
Well, it seems you ended up figuring out the regional dating situation and you’re now living happily ever after. What advice would you give to someone else trying to navigate the complexities of dating in regional Australia? I’m an eternal optimist, so I think I would tell them to be optimistic too! You can’t give up. I also had a strategy and that was to find my best mate, so I stuck to that and it seems to have worked out. We all chase fireworks and the perfect romance, but, for me, that can be a real red flag and not always healthy and sustainable.
I don’t want to speak for you, but it also seems like your strategy was to have a go and that you didn’t really have anything to lose from putting yourself out there. I suppose it was that too!
Harriet | 24
Without giving too much away, can you tell me a little about yourself? I grew up in central Queensland and I’ve lived my whole life in regional Australia, minus a few years at boarding school. I now work as a photographer but for a long time I worked in corporate agriculture.
How did you find it, dating regionally and also trying to maintain your professional presence? For quite some time I worked in a producer-facing role and I was conscious of how I was perceived in the community. If you’re on a dating app for instance, everyone in your small town is going to see you on there. Even if you set your radius as far as you can, there are only ever so many people in that radius, especially when you live in central Queensland. I was so conscious of going to industry events and being seen on the app by the people I worked with. I know some people are genuinely looking to meet someone but there are plenty of people on dating apps that aren’t there for the right reasons. I’ve been in situations where I’ve overheard men talking about the women they’ve seen on tinder, there is still a real stigma around it I think. It’s a struggle to utilise that medium to genuinely try and find connections while juggling that feeling of potentially being judged.
This seems to be an example of how there seems to still be a lot of misogynistic undertones when it comes to dating in regional Australia. Absolutely, we’re willing to judge women for being on a dating app but we won’t judge a man. I have a friend who was working on a station and one of the guys in her crew saw her dating profile and then circulated screenshots. Not only did it make her feel awful, like her privacy had been violated but it also completely undermined her professional appearance.
In the country, in a small town, your anonymity can be so valuable but so hard to maintain. It’s impossible, there’s no way to just put your feelers out and see what comes your way. Everyone is in everyone’s business all of the time. It’s pretty uncomfortable.
Have you got any good dating stories for us? I had one experience on tinder, I matched with somebody and the next day I ran into them at the petrol station. Of course I was looking super glamorous when I was filling up with diesel! That stuff wouldn’t happen if you lived in the heart of Brisbane, it’s an experience that’s very unique to living in rural Australia.
Dating apps are awkward enough and then you have instances like this and it just makes the experience of using them even more awkward in the regions, which makes genuine people less interested in using them. You absolutely hit the nail on the head there!
I wonder if you think that dating apps might also give us the opportunity to show interest in someone that you already know, or know of that you usually wouldn’t feel comfortable showing interest in then in another setting? Definitely. I have certainly found myself swiping on people that I know that I would never make a move on in person.
You have a partner now, how did you guys meet? We met on a dating app.
Any parting advice for those out there in the juggle? Having found somebody and built a good relationship from the apps, I just want to encourage people not to give up. Yes, you have to wade through quite a lot of rubbish but there are people out there that are genuine. I guess I was fortunate to come across somebody who was passing through my area so I got a clean slate with someone new. There are challenges, it’s tricky and it can be awkward but if it works out – it’s excellent.
Bob|26
What’s the first thing that comes to mind when I ask why regional dating is so hard? There is no clean slate. I’ve dated all over Australia and there is no such thing as a fresh start, the rural community is just so connected – there’s no escaping your past. You could find yourself two-thousand kilometres away from your ex- girlfriend and everyone still knows your business because we all know each other.
You’ve obviously got a rotation of girlfriends at the moment. How are you finding these people? I’m a massive social butterfly, which helps. I don’t need a group of people to go out, I’m happy to go somewhere by myself for the night and make ten new friends. I don’t find it at all awkward or uncomfortable to go up to a complete stranger and make conversation.
You seem to just have this innate curiosity which I think must be helpful when it comes to meeting people, meeting women? Maybe that’s what it is, I also just have the confidence to sit down somewhere and talk to a girl. Not with any particular intention, I’m just having fun and to me having fun is talking to people because I love to talk. Women seem to like it...
Can you tell me about a time you were particularly badly behaved? There’s been a few. When I was up north I was working for a contracting comany so moved around a lot. I screwed a lot of crews and caused a lot of drama. It was a long time ago, I think I was only eighteen but I did once shake a girl’s hand when I said goodbye to her the morning after a one night stand. Probably wasn’t the best way I could have left things. I recently rang a girl I had been talking to, I was quite drunk. Apparently I asked her over for the weekend but I didn’t remember. Don’t you worry, she reminded me when she turned up at my house ...
I’m so curious, before you mentioned that you’re quite happily single at the moment but do you think that there is a piece of you that still feels like you should be looking for a long term partner even now? When I left school all I wanted was to get married and have kids. It’s what everyone in my family has done. At one point I got into a serious relationship, I fell in love, I was head over heels. It was so good, but after that didn’t work out it changed me in a lot of ways. I went numb and decided to focus on myself and to do my own thing. I guess I’ve become really comfortable with that now. It’s not often
that I’m not seeing someone though – I don’t leave many windows of time open for there to be periods of time when I’m fully alone. I’m not sure if it’s that great but maybe it’s also just my personality. I’ve been chasing women for years but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a desire to find someone to be with, to have a relationship like the one my parents have. It’s hard to be vulnerable and to put yourself out there for something real. I’ve had lots of sad phone calls with my mum, asking her why I can’t find someone I want to be with. Asking her why it never works out when I find someone that I really like. I want to build a relationship with someone, to be a nice guy and make the effort and to do everything in my power to make it work but when you try and it doesn’t work out, it really tears me apart. You ask yourself why you even bother when that happens.
Do you think all of our regional boys are a lot more sensitive than we ever give them credit for? Oh, yeah. I’m a very sensitive bloke, I just don’t let it show. I’ve shed probably more tears over women than I have anything else. It feels like a very sad thing to say, but I’ve spent countless nights crying myself to sleep over girls that have broken my heart. To be honest, as a rural guy I feel like we’re bred to be tough men. You try and pride yourself on being tough and a hard man but yeah, I’ve definitely shed tears.
When it comes to dating in a regional context, I find that there’s maybe some more conservative, or traditional gender dynamics at play. As a young man, how do you go trying to navigate that tension between traditional masculinity and the modern age when dating? Honestly it’s really hard. Things were so different for the generation before us but my parents are also the ones I look to as role models. As a guy, you want to be a manly man but you always have to make sure you’re not coming off as sexist. Obviously there are two sides to this but coming from a guy you’re like, shit, where do I stand?
Ruby | 39
How do you feel that dating has changed for you now, compared to what it was like for you dating when you were in your twenties? My entire twenties I did not date. I didn’t go out with a single person because I was certain I was undateable. I didn’t like how I looked, I didn’t feel comfortable in
my body. I was also battling with the other elements of dating in a small regional town where you know everyone, you grew up with everyone. When I was younger I also saw a lot of guys behaving badly, especially when it came to the way they spoke about the women they had been dating. I was hearing these awful things being said about gorgeous girls, the guys around me all wanted to date these girls but would also speak disgustingly about them. I didn’t want to be a part of that at all. Now I date a lot.
Do you think those attitudes towards women have changed or do you just feel like you’re in a different phase of your life? What changed that let you feel like you could start dating? Honestly I’m not sure. It really helps that I moved away from my hometown. I’m still living in a small regional town, just a different one. It’s a bit of a fresh start, I’m also older and wiser now. It’s easier to pick the good ones from the bad. We still have a very long way to go when it comes to the way young men treat the young women in their lives. Maybe I just won’t put up with that kind of behaviour anymore – when I was younger I didn’t feel like I had the power to do anything about it.
You mentioned before that when you were younger, you weren’t very comfortable in how you looked. I think you actually said you thought you were undateable. I want to talk about that some more. It was a gradual change but it was almost like I eventually found this place of liberation and it had a big impact on me personally but also all of my relationships, not just romantic ones. I had a lot of fear, and for such a long time I just felt really shit about myself. The thought of putting myself in a vulnerable situation like dating, I didn’t have the resilience so I opted out. As I got older I think my close girlfriends played a big part in me coming out of my shell. They helped me feel more comfortable, more stable and they were also starting to meet these really great guys and settling down. It bought back some hope for me. Once upon a time I never would have put myself out there, but I got to a point where I realised it doesn’t cost me anything to try. It’s not like I have this great dating success story. I’m still single, but I’ve come to a place where I’m really happy with how things are going and the way I’m dating at the moment.
I particularly love that about your story though, far too often we get stuck in this trap of being in this really traditional relationship, especially in the country. And I personally don’t think it’s the answer for everyone. It took me a really long time to get over the idea that I would have that traditional future. It’s hard to move on from that, from this thing you spend your whole life thinking would be your future. What else are you supposed to want when everyone around you is doing the same thing? It’s hard not to feel left behind, but I’ve come to a place where I can appreciate all the great things about my life now.
When it comes to dating, especially in the small town you grew up in, do you think it’s possible to ever really have a clean slate? It depends on who you are and how you grew up but I would say the formative years of my life all happened in the same small town and that’s what I thought the world was. I didn’t know how bad the dating environment was because I didn’t really know any different. It’s very easy to get trapped in that one place. There is something very comforting in knowing everyone around you, in having your family so close and being so connected to the people in the community but it also means that there is no starting over.
Talk to me about the apps, what’s your relationship with them like? I don’t love them, but if you’re not on them how are you dating anyone?! Sometimes I get adventurous and give them a whirl but then I’ll see someone I like, I usually already know them and already have their phone number. I could call them, but I’m never actually going to do that am I? Maybe I’ll give them a courtesy swipe but it’s probably not going to go anywhere.
Please explain to me what a courtesy swipe is? Apparently you’re supposed to give your friends a courtesy swipe. I think it’s a moral boosting thing? It’s just something that you do!
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