The Lemon Life | online magazine offering a fresh perspective on post-grad life.

Words by: Nicole Bartl

Image by: Crystal Bretschger Johansson

Ah, the Summer Fling. One of my favourite university traditions. For four months every year, I’d move back to Ottawa from Montreal to spend my days working at a law firm and my nights meeting up with friends downtown.

There was never a shortage of cute university boys to flirt with, also home for the summer, and I’d usually end up dating one of them for the summer. There would be a type every year: the sweet, goofy bartender in freshman year; the cocky, loud, business student in my third year; and, the hilarious, hot nerd between them. At the end of the day, though, they were all around my age, they were all students, and we would always split up come September, when I headed back to school.

Upon graduation,  I moved from Montreal to Toronto and found a whole new world of summer flirtation opened up to me. It seemed that overnight, I had not only graduated from university, but also from a world of boys, into a world where - to my surprise - I could turn men’s heads as well. As someone who had always had to flirt to get noticed, the attention was slightly overwhelming. I’d always had to be the funny, charming girl and suddenly I had men eying me from across the bar.

Flirting became an entirely different game. Suddenly, I was chatting about literature and current events, instead of Lindsay Lohan’s latest escapades. I ended up in a summer relationship with a guy 7 years my senior. One day, my girlfriends and I collectively joked about hearing “Chumbawumba”  on the car radio a few days ago and he laughed, saying that everyone in university loved that song when it came out. I told him that I was in grade 7 back then.

That’s when I noticed the crucial difference between university and the Real World. All of a sudden you’re playing in a much larger sandbox. Whether you’re at work, with your friends, playing in a recreational sports league, or flirting with the opposite (or same) sex at a bar, suddenly you’re an adult, whether you want to be or not.  Dating an older guy definitely brings that to light. I was not only expected to share my opinion on the financial meltdown and American election, but also on what shower curtain would look best in his bathroom. And while the relationship only lasted into the early fall months, I wouldn’t change anything about it.

Now whenever summer arrives, when the weather gets warm and the patios open up, I fondly recall those memories of days at the law firm followed by the nights of flirting with whichever boy caught my interest, then heading home wondering if he’d call me during the upcoming week.  “Casual” and “fun” are the hallmarks of a summer fling, but sometimes you find yourself growing outside the boundaries of an informal relationship. There are absolutely no expectations at the beginning of a summer fling, so you can take as little or as much from the relationship that you want.  And that’s the beauty of it. You’re never really sure what you’re going to get. Or what it could turn out to be.

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