Onely Clones Itself for Unmarried and Single Americans Week September 10, 2011
Posted by Onely in single and happy.Tags: National Unmarried and Single Americans Week, open salon
4 comments
Unmarried and Single Americans Week is coming on September 18! Break out the glitter, streamers, firecrackers, and peanutbutter-cheese sandwiches (hey, to each her own)! Copious Readers, how will YOU celebrate USA Week?
At first Onely wasn’t quite sure how we’d cyber-celebrate (though the peanutbutter-cheese sandwiches were a no-brainer). After all, most of our regular posts already support the point of USA week, which is to celebrate and respect the unmarried experience. So we decided maybe the best thing we could do was. . . more of the same? We could try to share Onely with a wider audience, perhaps reaching more people who (like Christina and Lisa a few years ago) haven’t yet actively thought about singlehood in a positive, proactive manner.
To that end, we’re going to start cross-posting Open Salon to see what sort of audience and discussion that generates. All content at our Open Salon blog will also be here at Onely.org, which will always remain our primary venue.
–Christina (and Lisa)
Popping The Question: So, Why Are You Still Single? September 5, 2011
Posted by Onely in As If!, Everyday Happenings, Your Responses Requested!.Tags: awkward questions, responses to why are you single, rude questions, rude singles questions, why aren't you
17 comments
This post originally appeared in the book Singlism, by Bella DePaulo. It reprises earlier posts–here and here and here–where Onely and our Copious Readers discussed awkward questions about relationship status and how to respond to them. Readers’ responses originally appeared in the comments sections of the above links. We look forward to hearing more ideas about how you all would “pop” unsavory or singlist questions.
Long before Lisa and I created Onely.org, I was on the phone with a friendly, interesting guy I’d met at a party (let’s call him Ralph). Some minutes into the conversation, Ralph hit me with the question, “So, why are you still single?” I paused, unsure how to reply. I felt as if he had judged my life and found an inadequacy I’d never noticed–the way I might feel when someone says, “You’re wearing that?” So I hemmed and hawed and cancelled our coffee date and never called him again. Extreme? Maybe. Defensive? Perhaps a little. Probably other things about him bothered me, too. But all I remember is that one question, and the feeling of a switch clicking over in my heart. I couldn’t figure out why Ralph’s words bothered me, not until much later.
Our friends, family, colleagues (and even strangers!) usually intend to be helpful and friendly when they ask:
You’re so [complimentary adjective here]; so, why are you still single?
However, when they pose this question, they imply that being single is a sickness no one would possibly tolerate if they could help it – as if singlehood were a gross, drippy nose that could and should be cured by a swallow of Sudafed.
In a series of posts on Onely, Lisa and I identified two major problems with the question:
First, posing this question suggests that because an individual has [insert complimented-upon superb qualities here], that individual must be 1) seeking a relationship, and 2) happy when in a relationship because of impressive personal attributes. It’s a case of faulty logic, really, to assume that a person’s personal qualities have anything to do with whether they should be in a relationship, will be successful or happy in one, and/or even want to be in a relationship.
Second, the question evaluates the single person on account of his or her single status – it seems to ask, “You are in this less-than-ideal state, but you have the ability to extract yourself from this state, so why haven’t you done so?” In other words, this question ignores the fact that a single person may not agree with the questioner’s assumption that an individual’s single status is less than ideal.
So, we asked ourselves and readers of Onely, what’s a happily single person to do when confronted by this question – or one of its many variants? The retorts ranged from snarky to goofy to politely educational. We’ve collected some of our favorites below: (more…)
Love Us? Then “Like” Us! August 31, 2011
Posted by Onely in Pop Culture: HOPE for the Onelys, Secret Lives of the Happily Single, single and happy, Take action.Tags: facebook revolution
4 comments
To Our Copious Readers:
Well, we’ve finally joined the 21st century: Onely’s on Facebook! If you “like” us, the bonuses are endless: You’ll receive updates about our blog posts, pro-singles events or occasions, as well as links to articles or websites of interest to the singles’ advocacy community. What’s more, you can add content of your own: Feel free to post to our Wall and know that you’re a member of a growing special interest group.
Now all we need is for you to “like” us (for incentive, we’ve posted a special bonus link on our Wall). Luckily for everyone involved, it’s pretty easy: You can just click the “like” button over on the right sidebar of the blog, or you can search for Onely (we’re a page, not a person) from your personal Facebook account.
Also, don’t forget that you can still connect to us via Twitter, email subscription, RSS feed – or you can go the good old-fashioned route of bookmarking Onely as a “Favorite” on your web browser!
Happy “liking”!
– Lisa and Christina
Bad Onely Activities: Packing for My International Move August 22, 2011
Posted by Onely in Bad Onely Activities, solo travel.Tags: cross-cultural communication, international adventure, Moving without much help, online research, packing alone, shipping boxes
10 comments
It was a Saturday morning in August, and all my clothes, papers, and miscellaneous junk had been pulled out of my two closets; now they laid heaped in large piles across my living and bedroom floors. My dog stared at me nervously from one of the few remaining free squares of carpet. I was all alone, and I was ready to cry.
Such was the scene three weekend ago in my apartment in Louisville. My mission: finish packing all boxes for sea freight and plane luggage for the upcoming move to Beirut. I had already packed the easy stuff – eight boxes full of books. I had already sold most of my furniture, as well as my car. But tons of work remained. My final departure wasn’t for another month, but the boxes (19 in all) were to be picked up on Tuesday, and I had two domestic trips planned that would keep me away from home for three of the remaining four weeks.
On this particular Saturday, I needed to sort all unpacked items into four piles – one pile for trash or recycling; one pile for charity; one pile for the sea shipment; one pile for use over the next month – and then I needed to stuff everything for shipment or upcoming travel into the aforementioned boxes or bags. Later, I would somehow need to dispose of the hills of trash, recyclable papers, and donatable items. Did I mention I live three flights up and have no car?
I needed to focus, and I needed help. But I was alone, in spite of making it infinitely clear to my closest friends for the weeks prior that this weekend was not only my second-to-last in town, but that it was the final push for packing and I would need their help. After receiving no voluntary offers of help or inquiries about my need the week prior, I posted a desperate – and public – plea for help on my Facebook wall Friday morning. Still having heard nothing, and feeling totally ashamed, I sent an email Friday night, once again reaching out to the six or eight people whom I consider my closest friends here.
Finally, by Saturday morning a few friends had acknowledged my email. But no one could help me, and some ignored the message altogether. I felt overwhelmed, but more significantly, I felt abandoned. I have lived away from immediate family for many years and am pretty independent. Truthfully, I hate asking for help, but of course sometimes it’s necessary, and I have gotten pretty good about asking diplomatically and not taking “no” personally. But facing my mess alone that Saturday morning, I couldn’t help feeling hurt because I had assumed my friends would at least want to keep me company since our time was short.
Maybe I should never have hoped for help with such a personal task. Or perhaps it was too much to expect my friends to understand what it might feel like for me emotionally as I prepare to leave while they remain. Even worse, it’s possible my friends aren’t as close as I thought.
But given that every one of the friends I emailed has never before avoided me and seems to like me very much (!), I am tempted to speculate instead that they may have a hard time imagining what it feels like to move without the help and support “guaranteed” by a spouse or significant other. All the friends I emailed Friday night happen to be in coupled relationships. While I *need* my friends for practical support and consider them family, they don’t need me in quite the same way. If I want to go out to dinner with a companion, I don’t have a ready-to-go partner. If I forget something at the grocery store, I have to go back myself. Some have moved locally several times, and while I’ve helped with the physical move, they’ve never requested packing or logistical help. Plus, there’s a strong Midwestern mindset here: I have few uncoupled friends in Louisville, and fewer still who have experienced long periods of being single. Many are regional ‘insiders,’ having grown up in the South or the Midwest, with families who remain in the area. Not that there’s anything wrong with that (I am a Midwesterner myself) – but I truly feel unusual in that I have been mostly uncoupled for the duration of my four years living here and have no family nearby. So perhaps I suffered that Saturday due to a lack of serious single-person empathy.
The good news is, I accomplished my task that Saturday and even enjoyed an hours’ worth of help Sunday morning from some of the same friends who left me alone Saturday. And I am damn proud of all I’ve done by myself. But I surely wouldn’t classify this as an enriching Onely experience!
- Lisa
Tragedy: An Excuse for Couplemania? August 13, 2011
Posted by Onely in Food for Thought, God-Idiot or Asshole?.Tags: grieving and coupling, singles and tragedy
9 comments
My sister called me the other day with a question I couldn’t answer, so I told her I would reach out to Onely’s Copious Readership for insights.
First, the background: My sister’s good friend, whom I’ll call Mark, has had an awful year. First he lost his job due to the recession and couldn’t find another one. Then his girlfriend cheated on him and they broke up. Then his older brother, whom Mark idolized, developed a drug problem related to some painkillers he’d been on for an old, ongoing back ailment. Bad times for Mark.
Understandably, he withdrew from my sister and the rest of their circle of friends as he tried to sort out his internal chaos. Knowing that they might well have done the same thing in his circumstances, but still wanting to show support, my sister and their mutual friends left him email, text, and phone messages just to say hi and let him know they cared.
The messages went unreturned, and no one blamed Mark. Then my sister found out that he had reconnected with his cheating girlfriend and they were a couple again. According to the grapevine and Facebook, Mark had enough emotional fortitude to hang out with his formerly-cheating girlfriend, but not to interact with his long-time friends. “I think he just really needs someone right now,” said my sister, aware of the irony of her words yet trying to be sensitive to Mark’s situation. “But. . . her?”
Recently, while under the influence of assorted illegal substances, Mark’s brother crashed his motorcycle into a tree and died. During the aftermath of this terrible tragedy, Mark continues to date his girlfriend and continues to remain withdrawn from his friends.
Copious Readers, in normal circumstances we chastize people who neglect their friends for a significant other (especially a cheating one). But obviously a brother’s addiction and death are not normal circumstances. (more…)
Singles and Spare Time: Defying the Laws of Physics August 3, 2011
Posted by Onely in Everyday Happenings.Tags: richard simmons, singles spare time; memoirs
9 comments
I’m single; my friend John has been married for about eight years. One day we were browsing a bookstore’s memoir shelves. I read a lot of memoirs, so I was excitedly pointing to a few books that I had either enjoyed or read about: “Ooh look, The Glass Castle! Ooh, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly! Ooh, Autobiography of a Face! Ooh, Half a Life! Ooh, Still Hungry After All These Years: Richard Simmon’s autobiography!” (I said I read a lot; I didn’t say I read highbrow.)
“Wow, you read a lot,” said John. “I wish I had time to read as much as you. But then, you’re single.”
Eh?
As our Copious Readers are surely aware, a common stereotype of singles is that we have oodles more free time than coupled people. This implies that coupling sucks more time and energy than any other life obligations. This is obviously not true, although it can seem true, given how “intensive coupling” (where your partner is everything to you all the time) is portrayed by media and social institutions as the only acceptable kind of romantic relationship.
At first I didn’t mind John’s comment, for two reasons: One, he is about the sweetest person in the universe and I know he would never want to hurt my feelings for the world. Two, he said it with a tone that sounded as if he were jealous of, or had admiration for, my single state. I think he meant it as a kind of two-pronged compliment: first of my reading prowess, and second as praise for my singleness. (Praise built on faulty assumptions about singles, but still.)
Then later I realized something that made the comment bother me more, so I had to vent about it here on Onely:
I, the ostensibly free-to-read single person, work thirty-five hours a week, often more. John, the ostensibly too-busy-to-read coupled person, is unemployed due to the recession and is relying on his wife’s income. Yet because I’m single, I must have more spare time to read than he does. Somehow, I have managed to defy the laws of physics, time, and space. (Yay me?) (more…)
Single Women: Tell Your Stories to the Camera July 22, 2011
Posted by Onely in book review, Great Onely Activities.Tags: Nika Beamon, single women of color, singles documentary, successful single black women, successful single women
4 comments
Are you a compelling single woman between ages 25 and 60? Want to honor Women’s History Month by sharing some of your life stories and lessons learned?
You may be able to take part in the upcoming documentary series Independent Spirit: Successful Women in America Speak Out on the Joys and Pains of Modern Day Single Life.
The docuseries is tentatively in the works now, inspired by Nika Beamon’s book I Didn’t Work This Hard Just to Get Married: Successful Single Black Women Speak Out.
The producers hope to hear from single women of *all* enthicities: Black, Asian, Latina, White, whatever! If you want to tell them what it’s like being a single woman [legally single or socially single], please contact Nika Beamon at denali17@optonline.net, and please include a .jpg photo and a bio, which are needed for the treatment package going to the executive producer.
–Christina
Photo Credit: 997 Ourem
If You Actually Read Onely, We Wouldn’t Make Fun. Promise. July 14, 2011
Posted by Onely in Great Onely Activities, Pop Culture: Scourge of the Onelys, Singled Out, STFU, Your Responses Requested!.Tags: dear college dating advice guy, stupid unsolicited emails
4 comments
Every so often, Christina and I receive emails from folks who obviously haven’t read our blog. Usually, these folks introduce themselves and say kind, generic things–”Love the blog!” “Keep up the great work!” “WOW! You two are such excellent writers, we’d like to offer you a book contract!” (Well, ok, not that last one.)
We’re flattered, of course. But we know they’re liars. How do we know? Because they send us links and encourage us to direct you, Copious Readers, to their websites. And their websites are, more often than not, about dating, intensive coupling, heteronormativity, and matrimania. As our real readers know, this is not what Onely is about.
So normally, we ignore the emails. Occasionally, we’ll send a kind but corrective reply. Although we always cringe, we generally take the high road, avoid the snark. We certainly don’t want to drag ya’ll into it.
But this time, we just can’t help ourselves. Christina forwarded me the following email with the comment “Oh, for god’s sake.” Why? Because at same time the solicitor is sharing links that prove he doesn’t read Onely, he also says that Onely is a sincere pleasure to read.
Hi Lisa,
We would love to share with you an article that we just posted on our own blog! “20 Best Blogs for College Dating Advice” (http://www.onlinecollegecourses.com/2011/07/12/20-best-blogs-for-college-dating-advice/) would be an interesting story for your readers to check out and discuss on your blog.
Either way, I hope you continue putting out great content through your blog. It has been a sincere pleasure to read.
Copious Readers, we wondered: What snarky response would you compose on our behalf? Here’s what we’ve come up with so far:
Dear College Dating Advice Guy: Are you sincerely reading now?
- LA
Marrieds: Too Good to Poop with the Rest of Us? July 10, 2011
Posted by Onely in As If!, Food for Thought.Tags: family restrooms, married restrooms, married toilets, Schiphol airport
9 comments
Thanks to our Copious Reader Eric for flagging this gem. According to CNN, Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport offers special toilets for married couples.
Why might this be? I can think of two reasons:
Reason 1: Married people cannot successfully perform their elimination functions unless their significant other is by their side holding their hand saying, “Don’t worry, dear, I’m here, you can do it, just relax and push!”
Reason 2: Married people, being married, are supremely mature and considerate public-toilet users, so they should not be forced to share porcelain with us seat-spraying, poop-spattering, flush-forgetting single types.
I think we can all agree that Reason 1 is pretty ridiculous, which means that Reason 2 must be right. Therefore the next time I transit Amsterdam, I plan to pull a wedding band and blowup man-doll out of my backpack and go undercover into the Married Couple’s Restroom (MCR). What do you think I will find, Copious Readers? A gentle smell of lavender? Ming porcelain toilets with silken rotating seat covers? Japanese rock fountains? Will I finally fulfill my longtime fantasy of finding a public toilet sparkling enough to wash my face in?
Of course there’s always Reason 3 for the MCRs, the craziest reason of all: (more…)
Happy Anniversary…. To Us! July 2, 2011
Posted by Onely in Great Onelies in Real Time, Great Onely Activities, Honorary Onely Awards.Tags: anniversaries for singles, cheese of the month, gouda, paper or plastic?, pet anniversaries
11 comments
Copious Readers,
It’s that time of the year again… When we head to the local Walgreens or CVS, stare desperately at the quarter-mile-long display of Hallmark cards, and wonder why, out of the thousands of anniversary cards to choose from, none of them – not one! – adequately articulates how we feel about beginning Onely three years ago.
Sigh. Guess we’ll just celebrate by enrolling ourselves in another cheese-of-the-month club and hope our little blog project doesn’t call it quits.
But seriously, we are wondering what occasions merit an annual celebration for you, our well-adjusted, single-and-happy friends, in lieu of the traditional couple-centric “anniversary.” Sure, there are work anniversaries, but we figure those are few and far between, given how often the average worker changes jobs or careers in this day and age. People might celebrate the anniversary of buying a house, or graduating from college, or turning in one’s dissertation, or choosing to move to Beirut to begin a career, or the first time one went to Trader Joe’s, or the first white hair…. (apologies for the free association!)
Lisa celebrates the anniversary of adopting her dog, Kitty. Christina celebrates the anniversary of ___.
Ahem. Full disclosure: Lisa told Christina to fill in the blank, but Christina couldn’t think of anything. After Christina cursed out Lisa for not making the test multiple choice, she realized why she couldn’t think of any milestones or memories that she celebrates regularly: she doesn’t know any of their dates. She doesn’t know the date she moved to Germany, or the date she left Germany, or the date of her first Chinese class, or the date she quit her underpaid job, or the date she adopted her beloved cats. She had never been programmed to remember dates of anything, except related to romantic relationships (or birthdays). So going forward, Christina decided to just randomly assign dates to some of her favorite memories. For example, she will now celebrate the anniversary of her first Chinese class every September 13. And every November 13 she will celebrate the day Alvin and Theo came to their new forever home. In fact, she may have one anniversary per month, like a picture calendar (or a period).
So, what is it, Copious Readers? What do you (or will you) make a point of celebrating annually, in spite of the fact that Hallmark makes no cards for the occasion? And perhaps a more interesting question: How do you celebrate?
Looking forward to hearing from you.
– Lisa and Christina
