I’m drawn to relationships with people that live in different cities. To quote True Detective, “You know how it is. You want a wife, but only half the time.” And for me the distance provides me with everything that I want in a relationship: intimacy, without the commitment.
Yet beginning a relationship in a different city is a doomed proposition. It leaves only two exists: too fast or too slow. You’re flying all over to meet up, and it’s all fun-drunk-good-time sex filled weekends. But that’s too much work for hotel sex, and the inconvenience of the situation causes it to suffocate. Or it develops rapidly; in which case you have to make a serious commitment to someone you’ve known through short bursts of honeymoon.
It doesn’t allow for anything natural to build: going out for drinks, low stakes, hooking up occasionally, and every once in awhile, organically, something meaningful grows out of that. Instead what you’re left with is either an extremely inconvenient fuck buddy, or a rushed long-distance relationship (long distance already being terrible, now without the basis of shared time).
