I'm at that unfortunate age where everybody around me is pairing up and people look at me wondering when my turn is. I must admit that this really snuck up on me because one day my girls and I were dating and dumping losers every couple of months and now people are moving in with their men and having kids. The saddest part though is that not only do I not see myself doing either of these any time soon, I'm dumbfounded at how completely miserable these paired up people are!
Picture this: It's a Saturday evening and we've got a ladies get together at my place. We're all standing outside at the balcony, by now almost everyone's nicely marinated on red wine, ciders and/or whisky. In the good ol' days we'd all be discussing our latest fling, the next holiday we'd like to take, lingerie specials at the mall or which Grey's Anatomy character you'd like to shag.
But a lot has changed since then, these days every word that comes out of people's mouths is: 'My man this, my man that...'. If it's not that, people are constantly complaining about the said 'men' or my favourite, kids! As the youngest child at home, I've never even changed a nappy, so kids are totally uninteresting to me. Until they start talking and learning how to use bathroom facilities on their own, I'd rather keep my distance. I often joke with my friends that they must bring their kids to me the day they want advice on sex /relationships/alcohol...
So, as one might realise, I'm the only one who's stuck in the good ol' days whilst everyone around me seems to have made a pact to mature and be responsible. Why exactly, I'm not sure. But I'm starting to embrace my new role and I'm now prone to raise controversial issues in order to spice up these dreary get togethers. On this particular occasion I decided to time my question well, just after yet another one of my friends had revealed how she'd caught her man cheating... again!
"Besides the love thing, why are you in relationships?"
Everyone stared at me like I'd just told them I'm emigrating to Mars. I'd clearly said something out of line. There seem to be a new set of rules amongst my friends, again nobody told me about this, I just had to kinda figure it out as I go along.
- Honesty is overrated
- We're here to make each other feel better (hence the tons of alcohol).
- If the majority is doing it, then it's right.
- There's something very wrong with you if you don't have a man (even if you find a broke, one-legged, 75 year-old. As long as you're not alone)
- Happiness is overrated
There are lots more that I'm learning as I spend more time in this foreign new world with the aliens disguised as my friends...
After a long and uncomfortable silence, one of them piped up:
"I don't want to be alone, and I don't think I should feel ashamed to say that."
This seemed to open up the conversation a bit more and more people came up with their reasons. These ranged from: financial security, to the kids, to expectations from families to 'we've been together for so long,' and even 'I like having someone wake up next to me,' and someone even said 'I feel more like a woman when I'm taking care of him (cooking, cleaning, sex)'.
As mentioned before, I already knew that these can't possibly be my friends, but this confirmed it. I heard every single one of their reasons and came to the conclusion that relationships are clearly for insecure people who need external validation.
It was at this point that one of my friends who'd been particularly quiet piped up:
"I'm not in a relationship because I'm afraid of being alone. I've been alone before and was actually quite content. If he left tomorrow, my life wouldn't come to a stand-still. But when he's there, he brings a different type of happiness into my world. He adds onto the happiness that I already have by myself..."
I practically clapped when she finished speaking. This was the one answer that made sense to me. I'd been looking for one person who would tell me that their relationship wasn't based on fulfilling some insecurity/void in their life. She made me see things differently, and I decided right then to try and find that the day I grow up and decide to be chained down.... many, many moons from now ofcourse!
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