The Stigma!

Well the week started off with a BANG – literally! BANG is the noise I made when I fell face first onto the packed bus Monday morning. Seriously if this was an omen to how the week was going to proceed I was in for a ride. After having the lovely older bus driver help me up, I proceeded to scurry to the back of the bus, out of shear embarrassment, and I then quickly looked up my horoscope for the week to see if it was an omen. And true to form my horoscope was completely useless.

It began by speaking of international moves with partners. NOT APPLICABLE! Single as always! Yes I know it is a cliché to talk about being single and the hardship we face, but whatever, it is my blog and it irritates me. It seems that single people at my age are always forced to justify their situation when showing up solo: be it weddings, work galas, even birthday parties. Where is your plus one? Is that supposed to be a rhetorical question? Because lets be honest my significant other at the moment is my mother - she is the one I am sharing a bed with and frankly that is too sad of an answer. A friend of mine, Miss Lady, who has the same social stigma as I were discussing how in our twenties it was socially acceptable to bring a friend to the aforementioned events - that way you had someone to deflect annoying questions and make fun of what people were wearing (really is that not the reason we go to these events? Open Bar & Fashion Disasters?!) But now that we are in our thirties it is no longer acceptable to bring your girl friends (and lets be honest most of them would rather sit on their asses in their Lulus than be forced to be another single girl at a wedding) and now you roll solo.

Though you maybe happy and truly confident in your singledom no matter what way you spin it, there is a social sigma!! My particular situation may be made worse by the demographic at my office. I work with men. You can count the women in an office of 100 on one hand. In our twenties most were single and both genders mingled in peace and harmony, however we got older and many married and it is like we are back in elementary school: boys on one side and girls on the other! And there I am left standing in the middle of the dance floor - ALONE. I work with the men, I know the men, yet social structure dictates I stand with the women on the other wall. Unfortunately the men fall right in line with this thinking because they do not want to deal with their wives on the drive home giving them the third degree about “that girl” they were talking to at the bar. Many of you are probably thinking I am over reacting but it is unfortunately true. Women say men are possessive, I really think that possessiveness and jealousy is a shoe that fits both genders. I do realize that there are very cool married women who in no way exhibit these qualities towards single women; Mrs. Lucy is a prime example. Yet the majority falls into the following category: I once invited a colleague to an exclusive event that would have benefited him professionally. When the girlfriend found out his “colleague” was a woman – with never meeting me - she told him he was not allowed to go. Of course this was at the last minute and I was once again rolling solo (my mother was otherwise detained). How are women to move forward in the world of business if married women act in this manner? They might as well be this guy!

The other unfortunate part of being single in your thirties is even if you walk over to the wives side and they accept you with open arms, which to be fair they always do, you have nothing in common. Many of them are pregnant with their second and their favourite topics are weddings; either their own or some new fiancée that has joined the wives crew. Why is it that weddings are the bonding topic among women? Out of not wanting to seem like a bitch you are forced to ask the newly engaged woman about her dress, bridesmaids, flowers – I really don’t give a flying fuck. Why can we not talk about shoes? Oh ya because you spent all your money on the wedding and babies and are now forced to shop at Pay Less! Painful subject they try and avoid – just like the question they all end up asking me at some point in the evening? Why are you single? Don’t I want a family? I bite down hard not to respond “Oh because I decided not to settle like you!” What is worse these questions always have a sympathetic or even condescending tone to them. When you jokingly deflect the question with an sappy answer such as “when I meet a man I can stand more than 20min” in order to avoid the impending pity party they have planned for you, you are forced to listen to advice that is delivered like condolences – “you’ll get there someday” – BAH!!! You know 1 in 3 marriages ends in divorce (and it is rumored they cost much more than the wedding).

As I am going on about this, I fully understand I am in the middle of a rant and beginning to feel bad but then I am given the material evidence to my theory. While sitting here writing at Starbucks a friend of my father’s walks in. He is a very nice man and we chat for a while. After a courteous 5 min of “what is new?” small talk (stupidly I always assume that they are asking about my job when they ask that) it came to the topic of my love life. What he really meant by “what is new?” Nothing, still single! It turned into this 20min conversation about how being single is FINE and how I would meet the right one eventually and there was no rush, blah blah blah! Does anyone ever feel they need to pep talk a married women about being married – no it is Oh WOW you are married, Congratulations! I think one of my favourite thoughts from my recently married friend, the Lieutenant; when she graduated law school not a single member of her extended family flew to her graduation or sent gifts – a 3 year hard core undertaking and nothing. But when she got engaged – hell or high water they made the wedding. She looked at me with this revelation one day and said “does this make sense?”

After this man thankfully gave me the cause for my above rant I noticed that he never once brought up my Dad and it makes me wonder, does he know I no longer have a relationship with my father? I wonder if he even speaks to my Dad anymore? Not like my father would ever mention we do not speak, it would destroy the illusion he has created with his friends about him being this great family man – ha! I even found myself lying to this man about why I was in this neighborhood saying I was meeting a friend (which he snuck in – is this friend a boy? What are people trying to make you feel like you have a hairy mole on your lip?). I lied about not living in the neighborhood in case he reported back to my father. I even had to hold my tongue when this man graciously complimented the way I looked and that I had lost some weigh (which was very kind of him) – the response of “Ya that tends to happen when you start shedding thirty years of emotional baggage!” was so close to rolling out of my mouth.

In the end, if people insist on making singles feel bad about ourselves and basically implying that we have a disability and force us to justify our situation I want our own parking space at Super Store between the expectant mothers and the actual handi-capped.

Love Klassy Kass