Years and years I've been whingeing about being single and the plight that comes with, pissed off a few readers, got some interested, others irritated and bored myself with it. Then I thought what if I actually just came out and faced it.
I am single and am totally ambivalent about it, why aren't you?
It seems the only pressure I feel about being single is when I meet my married or to be married friends or those in a relationship. I get that nagging feeling which is lot like when I know I am supposed to do something but can't remember what it is and that makes me feel in trouble. So you understand NOT a good feeling. The rest of the time I am quite content and a bit triumphant like I've found the secret recipe to a long and happy life a bit like when you discover a glitch in a system that allows you to order things online for free but you don't tell anyone else for fear of ruining it for yourself (never actually happened).
What is so bad about being single anyway? My name is not single, I do not become "single", it's nothing but a socially constructed status, it is not an identity or something that you are or contract like a decease or a condition.
The pressure is mounting, it's palpable and frankly annoying, tired of the comments as snide as condescending like there's something wrong with you that you can't find someone to love you. With all your friends getting hitched around you and the growing a sense of self achievement and elevation that allows them to suddenly claim the moral high ground and the ability to dish out their newly acquired wisdom (presumably the wisdom descends on you upon placing a diamond or diamond-like ring on your index finger), they become the self-appointed gurus you should be looking to for guidance and ways to get a man to slip that much sought after Diamond ring on your
So jog on...ya! it's 2019 - why are we still talking about this.
Arguably, financially I am starting to feel it doesn't make much sense, as I am always the friend or aunty who buys the engagement, wedding, birth, birthday gifts and countless cards (it's a big thing here in the UK) which is amounting to a pretty little sum (did the math - you all owe me big time!!), always celebrating my friends' life choices which are the choices condoned and validated by society. Not mine though...you will never find a card saying "Congratulations on remaining single" and unless it's a birthday (if your friends actually deign to turn up to your birthday party), nobody seems very concerned about celebrating you or your life, 'cos everyone has got a one of those...a birthday! and remaining single simply isn't condoned by the patriarchy so you are effectively a dissident!
Furthermore, nobody actually believes you are happily single, expect for the ones with the same "condition" and are all women. Of course it is all a ruse in an attempt to regain pride and avoid humiliation in the face of this “unwanted” status.
MIC DROP!
PS: this is a very old post I drafted but never published. Now it's out, funny how it remains as relevant as I am single.
