Follow the Yellow Brick Road: A Note on the NYC Dating Scene

Pants: Hudson. Booties: Rag & Bone. Chambray shirt: J. Crew. Leather Jacket: ASOS (similar). Shades: Valentino (mine are vintage, and by vintage, I mean consignment, but these are similar).

If Dorothy wore leather pants and traded in her ruby slippers for a pair of burgundy Rag & Bone booties, I’m pretty sure this is what she would wear.  In fact, as I think more and more about Dorothy and her epic journey down the yellow brick road, I realize that perhaps her story is more common than we’ve been led to believe (abduction via tornado aside).  Not unlike many single New Yorkers, she’s clearly found herself in a situation in which there are no cabs, she’s been forced to walk home in her sparkly (obviously uncomfortable) heels, and the only eligible bachelors all lack either a heart, a brain, or the balls to ask her out.  And, what’s more, one of them also comes with a body hair problem.

Yes, this sounds a lot like the story of my life.

Since it’s a long journey down this yellow brick road and Dorothy has yet to identify any other prospects, she tries her luck with the Tin Man, an ex-banker who has recently hopped on the yellow brick road to funemployment.  Between his weekend substance abuse issues and his attempts to figure out what to do with his copious amounts of free time, he doesn’t even have the heart to tell Dorothy that he has simultaneously been dating Glenda, several munchkins, and half the Emerald City.  Before shacking up with the Good Witch of the North (who Dorothy has another name for that just so happens to rhyme with “witch”), the Tin Man sends Dorothy a text explaining that he will be moving to Spain for the foreseeable future.  Clearly, this is a lie.  Dorothy deletes his number.

Ughhh, men...

Since she is now on the rebound, Dorothy decides to overlook the Cowardly Lion’s sub-par hygiene and agree to a date.  The date is amazing (superfluous body hair aside), so they go on several more.  They are dangerously close to the point at which they might actually be dating and have even become friends on the Oz social network equivalent of Facebook.  But a few days pass, and Dorothy doesn’t hear from the Lion.  Assuming he must be so busy that her existence has temporarily slipped his mind, she texts him asking if he has weekend plans.  As she waits patiently by her iPhone, though, she quickly realizes that the Cowardly Lion also lacks the courage to respond, offer her an explanation, or otherwise dump her properly.  She silently curses herself for dating someone who doesn’t wax and then deletes his number as well.

So now, Dorothy’s only option is to completely abandon all semblance of her standards and date an idiot.  After a tenuous conversation about his aspirations to mediocrity, it becomes painfully obvious that she and the Scarecrow have absolutely nothing in common.  They mutually agree to part ways. 

Dorothy is now alone, her fate held in the palm of the illustrious Wizard, who is probably too busy securing a third round of funding for his startup to respond to her text messages anyway…  

The only natural next step is for Dorothy to get a makeover in the Emerald City so she at least feels desirable and to subsequently max out her credit card on new shoes.

So don’t blame Dorothy for having a shopping problem… you’ve really left her no choice.

Am I right?