(Re)watching Sex and the City when you’re in your 30s

I’ve been watching Sex and the City (SATC) again on HBO. When it first aired, back in 1998, I was 12 and clearly not the target group. I can’t really remember when I did watch it for the first time, but I think it was about ten years later. I’ve been watching all episodes again the last few weeks and I realized how accurate and familiar the stories are. Now that I am the same age as Carrie and her friends are in the show I can relate to so many of their experiences. And even though the series was filmed in a different time, when you’re single you still go through the same things.

Shoe-shaming

In the episode where Carrie’s (very expensive) shoes are stolen from a party her friend shoe-shames here. By saying things like: ‘I forgot about that days ago’. Or ‘You must have a lot of time on your hands’. Just because Carrie doesn’t have kids and spends more than 400 dollars on shoes her friend suggests that she has no real life, no real responsibilities or priorities. When you’re single you get to spend all your earned money on you and the things you enjoy. There is no need to make someone feel bad about that.

‘No soulmate’

When Carrie turns 35 Samantha offers to organize a small dinner. Sadly, in the end Carrie sits in the restaurant by herself for a while, before she has to pay for her own birthday cake and goes home. Later the four of them sit in their regular diner and Carrie says about her experience: ‘It felt really sad, not to have a man in my life who cares about me. No soulmate.’ I’ve felt like this sometimes on my birthday. But Charlotte’s reaction to this is inspiring: ‘Maybe we can be each other’s soulmates. And we can let men be just these great, nice guys to have fun with.’

‘No man, no armor, no faking’

Then there is the episode about being single and fabulous. Carrie thinks about what feels right to her, single and fabulous with a question mark or an exclamation point. She considers the idea that she may have been faking to herself that she was happy being alone. She realizes she’s scared of the idea of a life alone and in the end confronts that fear by having lunch by herself. ‘No man, no armor, no faking’. It’s okay to be alone, and it’s okay not to be happy about it. You don’t have to fake it.

25 years later…

Carrie, Charlotte and Miranda are in their mid-thirties at the end of the 90s. I can still remember how life was without a cell phone and internet, but I wasn’t in the dating scene then. There were no dating apps. In the first season I don’t think they even have cell phones or use email. There is only a home phone and an answering machine, and the pay phones on the street. These days it’s not easy to meet someone, even with all the (internet) options we have. When you watch SATC you realize without all the options it wasn’t easy then either. So what has changed for us in the last 25 years?