Single, This Time.

I was thinking about the art of being single, today. I was thinking about it a lot. And being single really is an art, for the effort that goes into it, for its individual expression, for the way others can look upon it and see beauty (or not), for the things it does to your soul.And being single is always a unique experience, even if it's been repeated a dozen times. Its circumstances always grow out of the context under which it was achieved, and those inform the state it lives in, and how well (or how poorly) it does.

And then there's the question of even being single at all. Do we want it? Must we accept it?

When you get to my age, and you've got a few (or more) hefty relationships under your belt, and you've lived through the "forever, I'm yours" and the "I've met another" bullshit, you sometimes wonder how you manage to do anything other than be single. By this stage, you've got enough education, and baggage, to keep your thoughts and doubts tingling endlessly. The thing is, we're a generation of lunatics. We simultaneously repel love by what we bring to it, which is, unfortunately, a sense of deep suspicion, or worse, the inability to care, (like someone who's had too many electric shock treatments and the sensation of unique appreciation has worn off, and we've become numb); and we desperately crave love, with the idealistic hope that someone will break through and convince us that the failings, the broken promises, the sum total of what we've experienced and been disappointed by, can't possibly be it, right? It can't possibly be all there is to look forward to before we make that grand, final exit, stage left.

But while we're trying to figure all that out, we're single. So what does single look like this time?

Single, this time, means treating myself to Lush bath bombs, and picking out exactly the ones I want. Single, this time, means picking out the movies I want to watch at the video store, and not wondering if I'm going to be a disappointment because I chose "Saved" with that teenage singer-turned-movie-star chick. Single, this time, means walking around downtown and staring in store windows, and seeing the reflection of couples cuddling madly on the streets, and wondering if they really know what they're in for. Single, this time, means there was no choice. Single, this time, means abandoning the games and the schemes and the attempt to be what I think someone else will find charming, or mysterious, or delightful enough to ask out on a second date. Single, this time, means losing a lot of weight, discovering that I am a hot ticket, and finding it not enough anyway. Single, this time, means paying my own bills and wondering how I came to be an adult without even noticing it. Single, this time, means that maybe the world really is as it appears in the movies, surreal and tinged-blue sepia. Single, this time, means there's no Mom to go back to, who will push my bangs aside and stroke my face and assure me that everything is okay. Single, this time, means being glad I'm not 18, but maybe wishing I was still 25, because pushing 30 comes with a lot of pressure.

Single, this time, means a whole host of new discoveries, both amazing and terrifying. That I am, in fact, able to take up completely new interests (the guitar, biology, hair dye, Thomas Merton) and succeed in some of them, if not all of them. That I am, in fact, in danger of becoming an alcoholic, that I've lived through a 15 year depression, that my perfectionism is debilitating. Single, this time, means the need to get my shit together accept that I am not what I thought I was, which is, healthy, strong, resilient, comfortable in my own skin, self-aware. Single, this time, means there's no more wiggle room left for compromising.

Single, this time, is amazing, if not always comfortable. It is hopeful and rich, in a way it never was before. It's beyond merely existing, beyond merely making goals to set my sights upon, beyond merely seeking distraction until the time passes and someone new comes along to fill up my interests.

Single, this time, means honesty and the inescapable fact of it. I am not who you, or I, thought I was. I am capable of deceit, bad decisions, lack of integrity, and my own supreme failing. Single, this time, means looking it all boldly in the face and saying, "Okay. Fine. Now what?"

I wish for you, the next time you find yourself single, this time, some understanding, and if not, the working out of things anyway.