Students Seek Love Outside The Gates

"I just can't find anyone here."

"Where are you supposed to meet someone, Loker?"

"She said she'd love to go out, but she has three response papers and a problem set tonight."

Complaints about the Harvard dating scene are as perennial as Valentine's Day itself. The list of grievances is long and familiar: nowhere to meet, no time to date, no one to choose from--except for other overworked, type-A Harvard students.

Everyone complains, it seems. But some lucky students have found an alternative. Their relationships stretch beyond the boundaries of Harvard.

Students who date off campus range from those with high school sweethearts at other colleges to those who've actually moved off campus with their significant others. The drawbacks can be significant: dividing time between two places and feeling withdrawn from your own college can be a danger.

But those with off-campus boyfriends and girlfriends say their relationships make it all worthwhile.

"I have definitely never met

anyone here who could even hold a candle to him," says Claire W. Lehmann '02, who lives in the Dudley Co-op with her boyfriend. "In that sense I'm certainly not sad that I'm not dating a Harvard student."

Setting Up House

Lehmann only spent a single semester in Thayer Hall last year before moving to the Co-op.

She was in a serious long-distance relationship with a 28-year-old man who lived in Alabama. With her relationship looming so large in her life, Lehmann says she could never feel like part of life in the Yard.

"I wanted to move off campus because I felt somewhat disconnected with the Harvard community in general, mostly because I was seriously involved with somebody so much older and so far away," Lehmann wrote in an e-mail message.

Many of the traditional bonds that link first-years together--asking a date to CityStep, going out with boyfriend and roommates--did not apply to her.

And because her boyfriend was so much older and so removed from Harvard life, she never strengthened those connections.

"My interests and general world-view were so dissimilar due to being involved with someone in such a different place in his life than your average college freshman," she wrote.

The everyday details are difficult as well, especially since Lehmann's boyfriend now lives with her in the Co-op, having moved to Boston this year.

"The logistics of having an off-campus boyfriend when living in a dorm are just kind of tough, in terms of eating in the dining hall, roommates" and so on, she wrote.

Even when your significant other is the same age as your roommates, it can still be difficult to blend an off-campus relationship with on-campus life.

Dennis Chvatik '02 would have lived in a House if not for his girlfriend.

But when he came to Harvard from his home in Germany, the couple was already in love.

"We wanted to try a long-distance relationship, but we missed each other so much that she decided to follow me to the U.S.," Chvatik wrote in an e-mail message.

Today, Chvatik's girlfriend attends the Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston, and they live together in a Cambridge apartment.

Like Lehmann, Chvatik feels disconnected from Harvard's social scene.

Although he says that he and his girlfriend divide their time equally between their two campuses, "half the time spent socializing in one place means one-quarter the effect because you need to get over a threshold with people to get a real social relationship going."

For Lehmann and Chvatik, Harvard comes second.

"Now that my boyfriend lives in the area, I basically spend all my free

time with him, which has certainly had a huge impact on my Harvard-based

social life," Lehmann wrote in an e-mail message.

"Basically I never developed a Harvard social life because of

his presence in my life.... There are definitely times when I wonder if I

should regret the fact that I haven't made an effort to spend more time

being social at Harvard."

But she adds that she doesn't lament her choices when she thinks about her boyfriend.

"It's definitely a plus to be with someone who can offer some perspective on the college experience in general, and who isn't all caught up the intricacies and difficulties of Harvard."

Going the Distance

For many off-campus couples, however, distance means living together isn't an option.

Although they split their energy as well, students in long-distance relationships don't feel as disconnected from Harvard from day to day. But dating someone from another city has hassles of its own--a significant part of life is miles away.

Despite frequent phone calls, e-mails and chats on AOL Instant Messenger, the absence is often hard to take.

"It's very difficult knowing that you care about someone so much but know that you can't see him all the time," says Kelly E. Morrell '02, whose boyfriend attends the University of Pennsylvania.

Morrell tries to tie her two worlds together by talking to Harvard friends who know her boyfriend. By telling stories about him, he stays "real" in her mind, she says.

"When someone isn't around all the time, there can be a problem of attaching an ideal to what they really are," Morrell added.

Still, the distance allows Morrell greater personal freedom.

"It gives me a chance to carve out a collegiate life for myself without him here," she says.

Matthew D. Bucknor '03, whose girlfriend attends Brown University in Providence, R.I., says long-distance relationships are a chance to have it all.

Despite retaining an intense connection to his girlfriend at Brown, Bucknor still feels active in the Harvard social scene.

"I feel like I have that major part of my life, but I also have my social life here that I'm embracing," he says.

At least Providence is only an hour way, and Bucknor and his girlfriend both live in the same town in Maryland.

Brett A. Barnett '03 is always 3,000 miles away: his girlfriend attends Santa Clara University in California and lives in Seattle, a continent away from Cambridge and his home in New Hampshire.

Barnett and his girlfriend met at a summer program before their senior year in high school. They have been together for a year and a half but have only spent a total of one month together face to face.

"Sure, it's quite a bit of effort," Barnett says, "but not as much effort as having someone here. I can tell her when I have big problems that I need to talk about, but minor things I can deal with on my own and little things don't cause big problems in the relationship."

He tries to lead as normal and active a social life as possible.

"You've got to live life to its fullest," he says. "When I'm here and I'm at a party, I'm there to have fun and I'm willing to do whatever it takes to have fun as long as it doesn't compromise my relationship with my girlfriend."

Barnett admits that he has been tempted by other girls closer to home. But he always finds himself comparing them to his girlfriend, and in the end, she always wins out, he says.

The couple is biding their time until graduation--Barnett's girlfriend may take advanced standing and come east for graduate school.

Until then, Barnett says, they remind themselves that the distance is only temporary.

"Every time that we go to say goodbye, we look each other in the eye and say, 'This isn't the last time we're going to see each other,'" he says. "It helps us remember that this isn't really goodbye."

A Middle Ground

Off-campus dating poses unappealing choices for some couples: If your significant other lives too far away, you may never see him or her; but if they live with you in Cambridge, you may never see Harvard.

However, some students find a middle ground.

Although Ashley A. Cunha '02 has a boyfriend at Boston University (BU), both remain active in their schools' social worlds.

While she divides time between BU and Harvard, Cunha says that she does not feel cut off from Harvard life.

She chose to live in Cabot House rather than finding an apartment with her boyfriend.

"If I lived off-campus, I feel like I would miss out on a lot of college, what college is supposed to be about," Cunha says.

Matthew A. Stratton '00 feels the same way.

He met his girlfriend back home in California at a dinner party the summer before his first year at Harvard.

For the first two years they took the long-distance route, since she attended California State University, Sacramento.

Last year, however, she transferred to Northeastern University, a 30 to 40-minute subway ride away.

Now the couple spends one night a week together at Northeastern and the weekends at Harvard.

They try to combine their social worlds as much as possible, Stratton says.

"I've really tried to make an effort to stay connected here and not be sucked away to the other school," he says.

The Home Front

Most off-campus couples say it's difficult to make their relationships work. But many of them say that dating at Harvard has its own pitfalls.

Caroline N. Whitbeck '01 used to date a student at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston who she met at a BU party.

"On the whole I think BU kids

are more attractive and a lot less high-strung," she says.

But her relationship wasn't "a conscious anti-Harvard decision, it just plain happened," she wrote in an e-mail message. The proof? Her current boyfriend is a fellow Harvard student.

Morrell agrees: although she did not consciously avoid the on-campus dating scene, the pool of students at Harvard "is just really homogeneous. By going off campus you get a better variety."

Not only are Harvard students similar to one another, one senior who lives off-campus says, but the traits they share make dating difficult.

"Of course people are anal, antisocial, busy," he wrote in an e-mail message. "Harvard is a community essentially based on the individual and his or her attempt to move forward and succeed in getting what is desired.... It doesn't lend itself to generous human interaction."

Chvatik says he doubts he would have found a relationship at Harvard like his current one.

"It really again depends on the kind of relationship you want," he wrote. "If it's a short-term, fun-and-forget kind of relationship, it might be fine. But finding something longer term here seems to be hard."

So if the Harvard dating pool is so lacking, why don't more students date off-campus? Chvatik cites the inconvenience of meeting someone elsewhere, let alone getting to know them.

"It's hard to find the right

person, and then it's even harder to find that person if you don't see her

because she is somewhere else," he wrote.

"It's just a lot easier to find and date someone on-campus."

Other students dating off campus say their choices were just chance. Harvard has a promising dating pool for those willing to look, they say.

Bucknor says he can't understand why some students complain.

"I can't generalize, but Harvard has a lot of interesting, cool people," he says. "I don't see how it would be hard at all for them to go out and date each other."

Barnett argues that dating off-campus doesn't imply a rejection of Harvard students.

The Harvard dating scene is fine--if you can find someone. But many students happen to find off-campus romance, he says.

"In general, I think there's a lot of potential here at Harvard to be found," he says, "but because it's college, a lot of people have already found other meaningful relationships elsewhere."