And now, ladies and gentlemen, the first of the oh so
important lessons learned about love and relationships.
5. Singleness is not a problem in need of a solution.
Life is good. I am generally quite happy with where things
are at. I have a rewarding job with likeable colleagues, a beautiful home in a
beautiful city, a reasonably functional and loving family, awesome friends, a
fantastically decorated bicycle, and more scarves and shoes than I could ever
wish for. Still, sometimes when I share my contentment with life at present,
there are those who say, “Now we just have to find you a good man.” They mean
well; I know. They love me and believe I deserve
someone to share my life with. As one of my dear friends said, “I just want a
good guy to come along and think you’re as awesome as we all think you are.” So
I appreciate the sentiment, but their well-intended wishes imply that my life
will never be fully complete until I am once again partnered up. A “good man,” they
suggest, is the missing piece to my puzzle (that sounded kind of dirty even
though I didn’t really mean it to).
But who can blame them? The message is everywhere. Few girls
dream of growing up to become satisfyingly single. We plan our weddings long
before we have even met our grooms. We talk about the future with the accepted
assumption that someday- after our days of wild, reckless and restless youth,
once we’ve explored and experimented and found ourselves, when we’re ready,
when the time is right- we’ll partner up and settle down. We believe it for
even the most hardcore partyers and the most dedicated bachelors. In fact, we
wait and watch with great anticipation for the girl who will finally get him to say good-bye to his womanizing
ways, or the guy that will truly whisk her
off her feet forever and always.
Coupledom is what we are taught to strive for. Miserable
coupledom is often regarded more highly than happy singleness. In fact, singleness,
to some, indicates selfishness, stubbornness, or unsuitability. The belief is often
that if someone is single for a prolonged period of time, there must be something
wrong. You hear it all the time: “What?! You?? Single? How is that even
possible? A smart, pretty girl like you?” The insinuation is that if I am
reasonably attractive enough, there must, then, be some other reason for why I
am still on my own. That’s when the
speculating begins: “Maybe she’s just not ready.” “Maybe she’s got too much
baggage.” “Maybe she doesn’t know how to trust men anymore.” “Maybe she comes
off too independent.” “Maybe she snores too loudly.” “Maybe she has webbed
feet.” And the funny thing is that if I were to say that actually, I’m totally
okay with being on my own, or that I am truly enjoying this newfound space,
there is often this little knowing smirk, the There, there, honey. You just keep telling yourself that look, as
if it weren’t possible to be both single and
happy.
For the first little while after I became single and happy, I was not too concerned with
finding myself a ”real” boyfriend (and I specify single and happy quite intentionally here, because in the pre-happy phase
of my singleness, when I was barely keeping my shit together, I was so fragile
and broken that I practically hissed at anything with a penis that dared to
even look in my direction, which means the idea of actually letting someone
close enough to make me consider being unsingle
did not even enter my mind). And I think, at that moment, most would agree, I
was off the hook- for the time being- from the societal expectation of finding
someone. I was new to the game and enjoying my freedom and doing what I have
come to affectionately call “practicing,” a term which in and of itself suggests
that I too believed that, eventually, when I had gotten my jitters out and built
up my confidence and figured out what I wanted, I would ready myself and begin
the quest for the real deal, the new Mister Right who could remake an honest woman out of me.
Then I got bored with the practicing, quite honestly,
because it’s kinda fun but also a whole lot of bullshit. And then, once I felt
like I was actually ready to maybepossiblylegitimately entertain this whole
boyfriend idea, there wasn’t really a readily available Mister Right, or even a
Mister Almost Right. I was “ready”
but single, which usually felt (and feels) totally okay, except that there is
still this looming, unspoken expectation and assumption that I will of course someday become unsingle.
And that’s when I started to have these twinges of insecurity and confusion,
because, on the one hand, I am happy-
legitimately so, sans partner, and I truly enjoy all the little delights and
perks of single living, but then the skype calls and emails always ask about
the men. Have you met someone? Have you
met someone? Have you met someone? (Again, I don’t blame them, as the
stories of meeting/starting/trying/dumping/humping are usually quite
fantastic.) But sometimes, those questions, combined with watching recently
uncoupled friends recouple so
quickly, and seeing all sorts of facebook pictures of engagements and
honeymoons and romantic getaways, and witnessing the 73 likes of someone’s
change of status to “in a relationship”, start to make me wonder if maybe there
is something wrong with singleness after all. Should I be out there more?
Should I be trying harder? Am I running out of time? Does that even matter? Is
it okay to be okay with being on my own or am I just lying to myself so I don’t
feel like a rejected, unwanted loser? Is it acceptable to build my life around
the me here now, and just be satisfied with simply being lil ole single me? Am
I as valued as a single woman/friend/citizen as I would be partnered up? And that’s
when I read this article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20219349,
and as I read it, I found myself saying, “Yes, yes, yes” because this guy
articulated so clearly what I had been feeling, and I felt like finally I had
permission to just be single- not shamefully
single, not single and looking, not
single for now, just single- one
adjective in a whole long list of adjectives that describe me.
So, my point is this: I am single and happy. The “and” doesn’t mean the two words are causally
connected. I am not happy because I
am single nor am I happy in spite of
being single. I just want to be happy, and as far as I can tell, happiness has
to do with being content with current circumstances while being open to the possibility
of the future. I don’t want to adopt a narrow view of what my life should or
could look like. I don’t want to become a jaded, cold-hearted bitch who has
decided if she is single now, she will be single always, leaving no room to let
someone new in, nor do I want to succumb to the pressures of attaining
coupledom by settling for a Mister Good Enough simply because I can’t handle
the questions, the speculations, or the lonely moments, because- believe me- there
certainly are lonely moments. They arrive at Christmas and New Year’s and on my
birthday, those occasions when I can’t help but remember and compare and be
reminded of all the togetherness that highlights my on-my-ownness. And there are, of course, those
few days each month when my babybox hormones work their PMS self-pity magic and
whisper hateful prophecies of my future life as a crazy cat lady. And there are
also those moments when I get a little, how you say, “twirly”- you know- hungry
for a good make-out session on the couch or for a strong man arm wrapped around
me in bed. And every so often, I miss some of the tender side-effects of
togetherness- the kisses on the forehead, and how arms and legs that know each
other well fit so nicely together; but then I remember all the other stuff, and
I know that while I certainly want to keep my heart and mind open to the
possibility of some gentleman’s awesomeness complementing mine, I am not
willing to sacrifice the great of my
current singleness for just a so-so
togetherness.
I guess what I’m saying is that I don’t want to live my life
in the sphere of not yet and someday, believing that until a “good
guy” knocks on my door, my life will never be as full and rich and complete as
it could be. I want to continue building a beautiful life now with
single me at the centre.
I want to make decisions about my future confidently as a
strong, big-hearted, single woman who has a hopeful and flexible vision of
what’s to come. I want to be totally and completely okay with being on my own
today and tomorrow and maybe even for always, but I also want to be open to
letting someone else come in and share all of this with me. And I suppose, I
just want to encourage others around me to see singleness the same way, to recognize that being single is totally okay. Totally. Those of us who are unattached don’t need to be
pitied or prayed for or matched up or consoled. There is nothing to fix here,
nothing to cure, nothing to solve.
Let me leave you with this little bit I read the other day-
another article that had me nodding my head in agreement: http://www.xojane.com/sex/stuff-not-to-say-to-your-single-30-something-friend
Now, I have more to say about all this love and relationship
business. My next two lessons learned were biggies, namely, that love (or
something like it) is pretty much always worth it, and also that you shouldn’t
have to convince people to spend time with you, but I got a bit carried away
with this one, so the rest will have to wait until tomorrow.
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