While I was fast asleep, my phone buzzed. What would have fluttered my 15-year-old self’s heart was unamusing to my 19-year-old self. It was a Facebook message from a boy. It was 1:17 a.m. on a Thursday, so the message was naturally suspect. I had never spoken to him before, but he saw my profile and wanted to add me because we have mutual friends. “Why are you single? Are guys just jerks? Because you’re way too pretty to be single,” the message read in more colloquial, text speak than I am using here. He ended that wonderful sentence with an emoji of a monkey covering his eyes, used to relay his complicated sense humor, I’m sure. To protect his identity, and to stop him from being ridiculed for his lack of etiquette and correct use of grammar, we’ll refer to him only as “Jim.” Enigmatic Jim pontificates everything that is wrong with society’s attitudes towards single people, and the misconceptions that follow.
Suddenly, thanks to Jim, there was a level of unattractiveness of being single. By deciding that I was “too pretty to be single” he created a hierarchy of those who were single, ranking me just above the ugly ones who, according to Jim, deserved to be single. Single, in his eyes, meant unwanted. Single meant unattractive. Single meant undesirable, unloved and unfortunate. Following Jim’s logic, all those who end a relationship and become single automatically become ugly because according to him, single equates with ugliness. Either he took one too many logic theory classes and took them to heart, or didn’t take enough gender studies classes.
All logic evaded him as he tried to decipher why I, someone whom he had never met, was single. The answer is simpler than anything I’m sure he’d conjure up — I am not in a place where I am able to choose being in a relationship. It sounds like the working woman’s cliché, but I am too busy to be in a relationship.
Right now, I cannot dedicate the time and effort it takes to be in a relationship. I cannot dedicate the right amount of time to fostering a healthy relationship. Balancing school, work, my different friend circles and calling my grandmother every week hardly leaves me enough time to invest in the relationships on “Scandal,” let alone my own relationships. There is a timing and cyclical nature to everything. I enjoy dividing my time between these different areas, and as of this period of time in my life, I am okay with not dividing that time further by being in a relationship.
This may not be the case for everyone, nor is it an attack on people who are in relationships. I applaud those who have been able to find a balance between all of the things going on in their lives and still make it to date night on time. I believe that relationships can be wonderful, fun, engaging, challenging, frustrating and infuriating all at the same time. But a relationship, however wonderful, is still a constant and daily choice. You have to choose to be a part of a partnership that engages and challenges, like every relationship we create, and takes time to foster. Being in a relationship means creating a balance between your partner and all the other things that are important to you.
As for me, I know that one day I’ll meet someone who will make me want to reconsider my schedule — maybe someone who will want to watch “Scandal” with me. Until then, I won’t hold my breath for every boy who believes I am too pretty to be single. I am pretty. I am pretty brilliant, pretty driven, pretty dedicated and I have pretty high standards. I am also pretty fed up with people who believe that single means unwanted, ugly or the like.
Jim has helped me reconsider what it means to be single, just maybe not in the way he intended. Single is beautiful. Single is not broken. Single is no different than committed. Single is not ready just yet. Single is okay with being single. So am I.
Meredith loves telling stories and pretending to be Carrie Bradshaw, minus the man and comfy NYC apartment. She, however, eats enough brunch to cover all six seasons. When she's not drowning in 16th-century literature, she can be found lamenting over the bad grammar and bad boys in her middle school diary.
Find her on twitter @merewilsh or email her mwilsher@bu.edu with all your love musings or questions.
I think you misinterpreted what he said. He used one of the oldest pick up lines in the book and wasn’t trying to impose some sort of “hierarchy” upon you.