Onely.Org

A Onederful Year June 22, 2009

One year ago today, Christina and I posted for the first time on what it means to be single and happy. Since that day, Onely has proven to be an exciting and continually evolving blog project that both of us are thrilled to continue. The idea for Onely emerged from two separate, seemingly unrelated experiences that Christina and I had in June 2008.

For me, I experienced an unexpected surge of happiness after I “told off” a guy after he stood me up – a second time. Instead of insisting that he apologize and/or beg for forgiveness, I told him instead, “We don’t have to date, you know.” Uttering those words — instead of words of blame or anger — made me feel suddenly, and surprisingly, free: I had articulated something that I had been wanting to say for some time but didn’t know how — I didn’t have to pursue a relationship, and I could be honest about what I wanted (or didn’t) even in a “casual” dating situation.

For Christina, it was during one week at work when she received yet another email celebrating yet another coworker’s marriage or baby (or second or third baby). “An office shower!” the messages always said. The  suggested donation was always five dollars and the food was always pizza. Christina hates pizza. She wanted the office to buy her veggie wraps, but it seemed the only way she was ever going to get a veggie wrap was to get married or knocked up.

We commiserated on the phone one day in mid-June about our shared anger at these situations. I told Christina that her office culture sounded very “heteronormative”.  “Hete-what?” she said.  I explained its meaning (see our sidebar!), and we have both been happily flinging the word about ever since.

During that conversation, we also discussed the relief we felt about not being in or even pursuing relationships, heternormative or otherwise. I wondered out loud why no one ever seemed to admit to being happy and single and not seeking to change their status.  Shortly thereafter — after a flurry of emails and Christina’s brilliant epiphany for a blog title — Onely was born.

We weren’t sure that anyone would actually read us, but now we are flattered by a regular presence of Copious Readers who inspire us to keep writing. And although we began blogging because we didn’t see others writing about being single and happy, we have since discovered a rich community of like-minded single bloggers and writers who provide perspectives supportive of, though sometimes different from, our own.

As of today, we’ve proud to have written 215 posts of varying degrees of literary merit. We’re also proud that “nut-sucking” and “animal sex” are apparently two of the best ways for people to find Onely in a random Google search.

–Lisa (and Christina)