Today is SAD--Singles Awareness Day!!!

As such I have decided to repost a past piece on the subject.

Confessionsof a GAP
Being A “Single”.
By Rory Lapointe

Being A “Single”.

Started out as an ordinary Saturday night—informal party, cute outfit, light drinking. All the usual suspects were there and we were doing our normal thing. Davis and I were on the porch, taking a smoke break and talking about some girls he had just met. We laughing as he explained how he isn’t really looking for much. I warned him to be careful about that and he talked about how he wanted to meet a single girl.

I laughed at the sentiment and cracked some joke about open relationships and Davis just shook his head. He explained how I was just like him—“a single”. At first I took offense, did it mean that I was somebody who is just a loner? Somebody better off without a relationship?

Davis realized what he had started and how I might take it. He assured me that it wasn’t a dig but that I was just a different type of person like him, like Valeska. I wondered what made us different than most of our single friends. They’re normal people, just looking for love, for someone to share things with. I guess what makes us “singles” is a difference in how we do dating. A single doesn’t look at a girl’s phone number as an unclaimed lottery prize or expect the guy they met at the bar to call the next morning. We don’t spend days imagining Sunday mornings lounging in bed after one date at Vitello’s. And we never let them make us dinner or meet their friends till after we have gotten to know each other—which always takes longer than three dates.

We have learned to go out for drinks and not scan the bar for Mister Right, that a Friday spent with a bottle of wine and a good book can be the best thing in the whole wide world. We go to clubs because we like to dance, to parties to be with our friends and can handle coffee for one at a nice café. We know that being alone sometimes isn’t the worst fate in the world.

It’s not that we don’t want a relationship, love, someone to curl up next to at night—it’s just that we are willing to take our time to be sure that‘s real and not just taking the first available person. We’re not stoic or cold or jaded, but that we can see the difference between wanting and needing a relationship. And that one is much worse than the other.

But the best part is that we’re fine either way. We don’t waste time asking, “why didn’t he?” or “why aren’t I?” but know that when the time is right then it will happen. We don’t expect Prince Charming to be standing at our door some random day nor to find him after one movie and a couple of cocktails. We don’t notice the wait because we’re too busy living our lives to be lonely.

I guess at the end of the day, that’s the ultimate difference between being single and being a “single”; we know the difference between being lonely and alone. Being single is going on the porch for a smoke break and hoping “he” joins you while being a “single” is taking a smoke break, looking at the stars and enjoying the view.