And then there was one: What’s a girl to do when her last friend gets hitched?
A friend of mine got married last weekend. I’m very happy for her. Very happy. I’m saying this without a trace of cynicism or jealousy. She’s completely in love with the guy and he’s completely in love with her and I think they’ll be very happy together.
There is little part of me, though, that can’t help but see this as a defining moment in my life. She’s the last of my single girlfriends to get married. And she’s a few years younger than me.
It’s official. I’m the last single woman standing.
Now, unlike a lot of the woman I know, I’ve never been dying to get married. Never had baby fever. And I’m not particularly sorry that I probably won’t have a husband and a kid. Those were choices I made a long time ago and I’m cool with them. I don’t actually dislike my life as a single woman.
But not having any single girlfriends left does change things for me. Even if only subtly. I feel like a bit of a pariah. Like the one person who wasn’t invited to the ball.
I can already see the next few years turning in to one big awkward social situation. I’ll be the only single at the dinner parties. Except sometimes it’ll just be too awkward to have me around, so I won’t be invited at all. I’ll understand and won’t have any hard feelings about it, but it will be sad to see less of my friends.
And everyone I know will suddenly feel even more obligated to try and set me up. Which is sweet. And I usually don’t mind. Except for when they set me up with complete jerks. My worst date ever was a set up from a friend. Twenty times worse than any online dating experience I’ve ever had.
Anyway, I’m already embracing this new stage of my life. Not having a husband and kids has allowed me up to do so many amazing things in the last few years that I could never have if I was “tied down”. It’s my choice, and as far as I’m concerned I’m not alone, I’m free.
Simone Grant is the author of the blog, Sex, Lies & Dating in the City and a member of SingleWomenRule.com.
Wow! YES! I too am the last single woman standing. And its strange. Its very strange. And it has made me feel that I must make new friends. Especially as those friends have kids and their lives become entirely full of family and I decide not to make their lives mine. I think its important to have single friends but for most people, being single is a transient state and so it is hard to pin down a single friend for long.
I haven’t dumped my married friends. I don’t know if they have dumped me (sometimes it feels like it) but I do need friends that reflect the person I now am and who can relate to my (sometimes vastly) different experience.
In some ways, I find those women here (and on the other singles blogs!)
I also am the last single. I suppose my reflection may be different because I actually always wanted to be married and have a family.
What I realized recently when I went through a big personal loss is that my married friends weren’t there for me as much as I would have liked/needed. Some of it was time issues (all with small kids) but I also think that they all have good husbands (really great men) to lean on in their own crisis and may have forgotten what it is like not to have that.
And yes, I have already noticed that at times it appears to be easier not to have me if it is going to be all couples. I also have noticed that they are more likely to cancel on me, change plans, and mostly I need to come to them.
They are great girls with great families and I care very much for them. I suppose I feel an envy because that was always my desire, but I am happy for them and try to be a great friend to them all the same.
Like Singlutionary, I find myself drawn to other singles when I want to make new friends. Although I definitely stay in touch with my coupled friends, it’s refreshing to hang out with women who have walked a mile in my shoes and are now on their second lap, not done with the race and thankful it’s over.
It’s true that my coupled friends have less time for me than they used to. To an extent, I understand. There are only so many hours in a day, and when a new person becomes a regular feature in it, there aren’t always enough hours to go around. What I resent, though, is what Sam mentioned, that expectation that my schedule should revolve around theirs. Friends who start assuming that I have nothing better to do than wait for a last-minute phone call from them find themselves sorely mistaken!
The silver lining is that, to be honest, I can always use more free time to work on my writing, my blog, my Cafe Press shop, or any of about a dozen other things. I care about all of my friends and would really miss them if we didn’t connect regularly, but some of them spent most of their single days drifting from bar to bar or party to party, activities that I found pointless and not all that appealing anyway. Now the time we do spend together is quality time.
And about those cocktail parties and family BBQs? Frankly, my singleness is a great excuse to get out of them! Sitting around making small talk about weddings and teething babies isn’t my idea of a fun Saturday night.
aaahh, I am so happy to join this conversation. I can so relate to what you guys are saying. I am not the last unmarried, but I am the last single. My position is slightly different because I was a member of the club until last year – when my LTR ended. I was essentially living as half of a married couple, but when that relationship ended, I realized I had no one to hang out with any more on a Saturday night – unless it included SO’s/husbands. After sorting through my feelings I realized I did not want my friends’ lives. If I wasn’t going to be with my ex, I wasn’t going to scramble and try to find a replacement just so I could be like everybody else. I honestly don’t have marriage or baby envy, but I’m happy for all my friends who feel that that life fulfills them.
To be honest, it’s why I joined SWR and started the LA chapter; I wanted to meet other single women who were interested in doing cool things with other women. Things that do not involve sitting around talking about how there are no good men around. I am tired of the assumption that if you aren’t married off by a certain age, then all your free time is spent analyzing or trying to remedy your condition. It’s ok to be single and it’s ok to be ok with it!
Sam,
It’s interesting that you mentioned your married friends not being there as much for you as you would have liked. I lost my mom this year. And I was really struck by how little support I got from some of my married friends (especially one who had been leaning on me so much to help her with her family issues). I came to realize that some of my friends didn’t think I needed support, ever. They saw me as independent and self-sufficient and virtually invulnerable.