Alright, my first "official" post!
One of the reasons I wanted to start a blog was to have a place to share my observations on the world around me. There are a lot of things I enjoy about being single, but I will be honest in saying I have been struggling with a few things lately - primarily feeling like I'm one of few single girls left in my network, and feeling like it's a challenge to find common ground with my formerly single friends.
A lot of this got generate by Facebook. I trimmed my friends list down after moving back from Australia 2.5 years ago. I had over 600 contacts on there, and was finding I was losing track of those most important to me after wading through all of the clutter of Farmville posts. So around 250 remained and here we are today.
Now over the summer, nearly every day there is are numerous posts exclaiming: "We're expecting!" "We're engaged!" "Our showhome is ready!" "Countdown to my wedding" "Happy Anniversary!" "Baby pics!" So now again I'm left feeling like - that's great - but what happened to all of my fun friends I used to party with?!? Not that I am a wild and crazy party girl, but I do like heading out for a night at the pub or to a concert. The days of being out at the club grinding up on a random guy are out of my system! But it would be nice to feel like I had more girlfriends to go out with to a lounge or for dinner, without having to hear about their kids, husbands, and how exhausted they are and need to be home by 10:00. I'm at the point where I'm struggling to find common ground with these friends - both female and male - and I'm caught "in between."
To give you some more background, I've lived in Calgary off and on for almost 10 years. After I got my CA, I was feeling like life in Calgary was getting a little stale. I had a great job, a great group of friends, and we were having a blast. However, people were starting to couple up, and I wasn't quite at that point. In the entire time I have lived in Calgary, I have never had a "boyfriend" and the longest I've dated someone is about 2 months. There was always someone in the picture, but never anyone I'd take home to meet Mom and Dad. I was having a lot of fun, kissing some frogs along the way, and that was fine by me. However, I was ready for a change of scenery and some adventure, so I packed my bags and headed to Sydney, Australia on a transfer with my firm.
Pretty soon after arriving in Australia, I met an Aussie guy through a former classmate. We ended up moving in together very fast, and dated for 2.5 years. When the relationship went sour, and I learned of some health issues requiring surgery, I made the decision to return back to Calgary. We did our best to stay together, with the intention that he would move to Calgary as well. However, the control and jealousy issues, along with verbal and emotional abuse, from him continued to escalate, and I ended the relationship. That is nearly 2 years ago, and I've been single ever since.
I recognize that I am not ready to date. The abusive relationship I ended has left a mark on me that is not quite healed. I have tried going on dates and have dated a couple of guys since, but I get spooked very easily. The first sign of control or a guy making any sort of demand of me and my time - I bolt. I was treated poorly in my last relationship - so I don't want to mislead anyone else into thinking I'm ready for a relationship when I'm clearly not.
On the social side - the feeling "in between" comes from a couple of sources. Before moving overseas, I had a great group of friends in Calgary, predominantly co-workers. Everyone got along great and we had a blast together, but there were two different sides to my groups of girlfriends. There were the girls that could out-drink the boys, and then there were the girls that wanted to get a veggie and dip tray and watch "Grey's Anatomy" together every week. I was sort of in-between, so I drifted between both and just wanted to get along with everyone.
What I noticed while I was away was that the party girls' partying escalated - to the point where it wasn't just on Friday after a hard week at work - and the serious girls got more serious. They settled down, got married, started having kids. So again, I'm caught in between. I made the choice to cut down the crazy drinking (I was not an alcoholic by any means - but due to my surgery, I made some important changes to my lifestyle - food, drink and exercise being the most important), so wasn't in a position to go out and party 3 or 4 nights a week with them. And I didn't really feel like going to dinner parties with a bunch of couples either. So what's a girl to do other than trying to make new friends that I have more in common with.
So that brings us to this week. I'm having a bit of PMS, and am tired of the wedding/baby/engagement posts, pictures, etc. on Facebook (Honestly, why do I even have a profile on there?!? Why does anyone with the amount of drama it causes?!?), and I (stupidly?) put up a status update saying: I wonder why there's not a Facebook group called "I don't care about your wedding/engagement/baby."
The post mainly got some laughs - from both coupled-up and non-coupled-up friends. But I clearly ruffled some feathers. One friend sent me a private message saying "I'm sorry if the posts about my daughter offended you, but seeing as my family does not live in Calgary, they'd like to know how she's doing." Another friend wrote a not-so-private comment on my post: "Yeah, there is a group like that. It's called the 'I don't care about your dog/car/shoes' group. Go check it out."
The first friend received a reply saying, I apologize if you were offended. Please don't feel that I was pointing the finger at you or anyone else in particular - that was not my intention. My intention was to make a generalized comment about the topics of the posts on my feed. From my perspective, it sometimes feels like it's being rubbed in my face, and that I'm the last single girl on Earth. She laughed it off and everything is all good.
The second post absolutely infuriated me! How dare she judge me like that?!? I work damn hard at my business - if I want to spend an entire pay cheque on shoes, that's my prerogative. One of the benefits of being single: You don't have to answer to anyone but yourself! After I broke up with the last guy I was dating, I took a little shopping therapy trip down to Phoenix for a week. Why? Because I can! I sent her a note saying that was a really bitchy thing to write, and got a response back saying "it wasn't a personal attack." Well it sure felt like it was my reply! I said the same thing to her I said to Friend #1 - she is welcome to lead her life however she wants, but please don't make me feel like I'm an inferior woman because I'm not married with children.
I called up a friend afterwards - she is thankfully one of my few remaining single friends. We have been friends since high school, and she is making the move soon from Regina to Calgary. I think we are both very excited to be closer together and feel like we have someone else with some commonality in our lives We had a good chat, and reassured ourselves that we would have a "Single Girls" shower very soon. (a la Sex and the City - you remember the episode when Carrie loses the Manolos at Tatum O'Neal's baby shower, and makes her replace them - fabulous tribute for single girls have to stand up for themselves everywhere!)
So, like Carrie Bradshaw, I'm left with many questions, and can't help but wonder: Is it better to be single or not to be single?
To be continued...
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