Dear beloved readers,

I am currently laughing more than I probably should. It’s just that I opened the Pages app on my computer – as I usually do when I am about to write – and there was apparently a whole paragraph that I drunkly wrote for you guys this past Tuesday, when Aria and I decided to get hammered at four in the afternoon.

Unfortunately, not even I could translate the drunken mess I wrote, except this one sentence, that went along the lines of “Truth is, only Aria can understand me as she is my only single friend, and being single is fucking hard okay?”, only with ten more exclamation points and a lot more swearing.

I just woke up from a nap and I am not feeling anything other than a great relief to finally feel rested and relaxed, but I think I should respect my drunk statement and write about this. And here’s the thing, I think being single is a lot harder than us, single people, take credit for. I don’t mean only in the actual sense of being single and therefore constantly  be looking for someone, honestly? That is the easiest part. But the thing no one tells you, and I’ve only came to notice this recently, is that being single comes with a lot of responsibilities, or rather, expectations.

First of all, if you are single and you are not into going out or seeing someone else every other week, you are lazy. You practically want to remain single forever as you are not doing your best to leave this outrageous situation you live in. Because as said here before, apparently being single is the modern day equivalent of being a leper. For couples – and I don’t want to generalize but since they mainly see us as either lazy or whores I think I must –, we either want to remain in this deplorable situation, as we never seem to do enough to get out of it, and the idea of some of us not being into this whole rule they somehow imposed on us, for them is almost offensive. And recently, I came to realize why is that.

Before anything, I am not going to come in here and pour names and whereabouts. But I think it’s quite hilarious how for some of my non-single friends, I am the funniest and most welcome company whenever I just came back from a strike of bad dates, but the minute I decide to take a break from it, I am not a suitable company anymore.

For a long time, I thought this was because sure, whenever we live something funny, and I’ve lived as you know, some pretty sketchy situation to say the least, we have a lot of fun things to write and tell. I mean, I have a whole blog that I mostly use to ramble about my life, and whenever I happen to live some of those crazy experiences, I feel the funniest, wittiest person on Earth too. Because if you can’t laugh at your failed love life, what the hell else can you do?

But my point is deeper than that. I obviously don’t come here every week with my failed love life to pour on you guys because I usually don’t even have time for said love life. I got to the point that my period was late this week and when my friends asked if I wasn’t terrified of being pregnant my only reply was “Pregnant by what? My dildo?”.

And there is no shame in not being a single-active person. People put such a bad stigma on single people it’s almost ridiculous how much explanation I need to give my friends when I don’t want to go out on a Friday night. Non-single people never see a Netflix & Chill night, by yourself, as something suitable, it is just simply depressing. Sometimes, I think they really just want us to stay single forever, so we can force ourselves to get out of the house at every damn day, and call every damn number on our little black books – or the modern day, dark mode contacts list –, and of course, tell them all about it.   

I used to be bothered whenever I complained about my lack of action and the usual response I’d get was “You are  single because you want to”, and it never comes as advice, or with an in between the lines that said I could pick up whoever I wanted because I am gorgeous. It always came as if I wasn’t putting effort enough, like saying asthmatic people are too lazy because there’s plenty air around them and they still can’t manage to breathe properly somehow. Okay, poor example, but my point is, that comment always came too edgy, too personal, and I never understood why when, in the end of the day, there’s nothing, absolutely nothing to do with them.

And today, as I was watching Drag Race UK and trying to copy every accent in there, someone said something that caught my attention, one of the Queens said that once you are married the action in the bedroom stops completely. Obviously it was a joke, I can’t tell you – and wouldn’t even if I could – how many times I’ve caught my parents at it when I used to live with them, and they’ve been married for longer than most of us exist. But still, that got me wondering how much of that can be true and how much of that reflect on the single friends.

Sometimes, specially when I am with my friends that I know have been dating for a long time, I feel like that third person, the stranger, couples invite for the threesomes. But instead of being there to have sex with them, I am there only to provide crazy stories about my sex life for them. I think in some level, after years of being together and what not, couples tend to fall in the routine which is normal and they will still make it seem as superior, but they will also still insist on eating off your crazy, epic single stories just because they want this kind of entertainment, without ever the commitment with the bravest thing one can be in this day and time: Single.

To be true to my drunken words, being single is fucking hard. It’s reapplying makeup late at night, pretending to laugh at stranger’s jokes and being the independent woman I am, sometimes even paying for a dinner I didn’t even want to have had. And then there is this whole part of the expectations the couples put on us for providing them great stories that they will love to hear, will sigh in pure lust, almost with jealousy – but not quite, because of course they remember their life is way better than that –, and my favorite, judge.

Sometimes, when I am telling couples about my “crazy sex life” – and I put in quotes because we all know it ain’t even that exciting –, I tend to fuck with them a little bit, making up the craziest shit I can possibly think of, just so I can see them going crazy and, quite literally, getting off on some twisted fantasy I built up. It’s hilarious really, they seem to be so unhappy with their dull lives to realize there would be no possible way I would, I don’t know, fuck someone on all fours in a public restroom. 

I am not going to be a hypocrite though and say couples wish they had what single people have. If that was the case I know for a fact they would most likely leave their relationships and join this sinking boat. Plus, that would be no point in telling this lie because being single doesn’t even sound, and probably it’s not even an acceptable stop in the love-life destination. After all have you ever heard a story about someone who died single that had a happy ending? Like, John died single and alone and unhappy and it took five days for someone to find his body because he was single alone and unhappy and no one even noticed.

Even speaking for myself, and all my other brave single friends, none of us want to remain single. Sure we have loads of fun and we make the best of it, we don’t envy couples and we surely couldn’t care less about their sex lives, but we also want to find our someone, we don’t want to remain like this forever. And this is problematic. Because it seems to me that being single became the modern day leper not only in the eyes of couples, but in the eyes of single people too.

I see this clearly with my grandma. My grandmother was the first woman to ever get a divorce in my hometown. She rocked the title for years and vowed to never love another man, and she did just that. But now she’s old and has Alzheimers and everyone, and I mean everyone, insists she is like that because she was lonely. Like, come on! Nothing to do with the neurologic system, it is just pure and only the single way of life’s fault.

In some level, I get it. As I said, being single is hard, there’s a lot of effort into this and everyone in the end of the day is putting said effort because they want to meet someone, it doesn’t matter if for the day or the rest of their lives. Being single is like, I don’t know, having a mental illness, it’s something you must ‘change’ unless you want to be looked down for the rest of your life. Again, poor example, but have you ever met anyone with depression that didn’t mention they’ve heard all their lives that they were “just lazy” – and the tragic part is that I can speak for myself on behalf of both, being single and depressed. (But not being depressed because I am single, that never.)

My point is, remaining single truly sounds and perhaps is the modern day leper, specially if you are a woman. If you are a guy and you remain single forever you will probably be envied by all your friends for being able to hook up with as many women as you possibly can and will forever be the cool uncle. As for a woman, you will have those huge, pitiful eyes being stared at you all day long and sad smiles along the so dreaded “There’s still time, I heard they came up with this new dating site–“, and so on.

I think I am writing single and non-single people as enemies in this one, but quite frankly, sometimes we are. I wrote a while ago about this said topic and said there is no war between us, I still wouldn’t go as far as say there is but I will for sure tell you guys what I left out of my last one about said matter: Non-single people think they are so much better than single people. I think this whole thing is rather childish and I don’t want to say which one is the best because I haven’t had much experience as a non-single person, but I will say that it is honestly pathetic how I don’t think there is a way for us to me equals in this whole mockery that is life – as a single or a non-single person. I said it once, I will say it again, we are the same, only in different sides of the love spectrum. But after all those realizations, are we though?

I will be straight forward and say I don’t hate being single, but I don’t don’t hate being single. I love spending time with myself and doing my things and never having to settle for pizza on a night I desperately want sushi, but I also wish there was someone for me to be with and you know, to be with if you know what I mean. And of course, as said here before many times, I don’t want to be single forever. I want prince charming and I want him gorgeous, thank you very much.

I guess it just saddens me that being single, remaining single is not a suitable status, not for me, not for my single friends, not for my non-single friends, certainly not for my mom, and everyone else I know. Being single will every carry the endless expectations of making the most of it, but I know for a fact that when I tell my friends all about it, the jealousy in their eyes last about ten minutes and then they go on and say the most pathetic shit like: “There is someone out there for you, you just have to keep looking”. And that is what kills me, that is why I’d rather spend a whole night discussing women’s rights with Donald Trump of all people than talking to a couple about my sex life. Because unlike what I sound on here most weeks, I am in no rush. Trust me, if I was, I’d be out and about every Friday night instead of sitting here in the comfort of my bed writing for you guys about my life.

I appreciate being single specially at my age because I feel like I get to enjoy things as a whole not as a half of something else. I do want to meet my someone and be with them for the rest of my life, but don’t think for a second that I wanted to have met this someone right away in life. Sure it sounds lovely to meet your soulmate at 15 and be together until you both die, together, at the same minute as one can’t live without the other, sure, lovely. But Aria asked me while drunk beyond her mind if I think I am ready for my one true love to arrive, and I remember being drunk, also beyond my mind, and thinking about all the fun I have doing whatever the hell I want and how much effort it is to be in a relationship and how much of a bullshit it is and how annoying my non-single friends became after updating their status, and I said as fast as I possibly could: No.

Of course the conversation went on about our commitment and daddy issues, but deep in my mind I was reaffirming myself that right now I don’t want that. Right now, at 20, freaking out about life everyday, I want to focus on myself and what is best for me. Sure, the green monster was there when Clair’s girlfriend was talking to me about proposing to her – the scheme is doing great by the way –, but now that I am sane and haven’t seen a picture of a diamond ring in a week, I can say that I don’t want to rush the process, and settle down for whatever, or give up on my current focus that is myself – and becoming the best version of myself, not for anyone else but me.

Being single may not be the final destination I want for my life, and if it happens, it might suck because the wedding I’ve been planning for myself all my life would rock. But right now, sitting in my bed, binge watching Drag Race and having no other plans other than opening a bottle of wine and making the best of it, there’s nothing I’d rather be. Because unlike what they led us to believe, being non-single is not that great either, specially when your source of pleasure is the fake sex stories I present on a silver platter. And I thought I had a lack of sex life…

I don’t know if we got to any conclusions after this one, but I will just say it one more time, being single is hard and honestly, quite fabulous. I don’t have any regrets and I have a lot of fun, I don’t owe anyone anything and I love my own company, and when I say this to people and they look at me with sad eyes, I look right back at them with sadder eyes because if anyone on Earth things it’s sad to be happy with your own company, well then I am not the one with issues, am I? Until next week, hopefully still single and fabulous! Stay out of trouble, unless said trouble is in the made up stories you use to entertain your non-single friends so they can get off and judge you later, if that’s the case – oh my god, tell me all about it.

– Your Girl on the Go