Happy Singles Awareness Day! And Thanks for the Hearts!

I have spent the weekend installing a new well pump - all by my little self .

It needs a bit of tinkering - but at approximately 7:00 PM last night, I had water running out of the spring. :bounce:

Still lots of work here, but maybe I'm free from hauling water for a while. :)

And then I log on and I have some hearts!

Happy Singles Awareness Day - or Valentines Day if you please - to all!



And Thank you to my secret admirers. I love you wherever and whoever you be.


:loveya: :loveya:

Love it! There is a lot of happiness in being single, too!

My cousin in Syracuse asked me the other night if I didn't get awfully lonely.

"Are you kidding?" I said. "I had six kids, remember?"

"Oh, yeah. I didn't think about that."

I love and miss my kids, and I love being in love and romance, but it's so nice to be alone as well, to follow my own agenda.

My kids coined that phrase years ago ( since it's the one day of the year when you are VERY AWARE of your singleness) , so that's what our family always calls this day.

It's perfectly fine, on Singles Awareness Day, to buy yourself some champagne and fine chocolate, and to tell yourself how absolutely beautiful and sexy you are :P

Awareness, to me, would not be proclaiming that "there is a lot of happiness in being single".

I would think it means 'awareness' of what Shari Motro wrote in the NY Times

"Research consistently shows that unmarried Americans are on average poorer, sicker, and sadder than their married counterparts. Yet they are denied perks given to married couples who, in many cases, neither need nor deserve them. Though gay couples certainly lose out as well, singles of any preference pay a triple price for not finding love: they don't enjoy the solace and support of a life partner; they don't profit from the economies of scale that come from pooling resources with a mate; and they effectively subsidize spousal benefits that they themselves can't take advantage of."

That first line, however, may be more true of single men, than single women. I still remember the longevity test in Newsweek. For a man, the health impact of being single was the equivalent of smoking a pack of cigarettes a day. For a woman, the health impact of being single was - nothing.

"The mental health data, chronicled in dozens of studies that have looked at marital differences in the last 40 years, are consistent and overwhelming: The suicide rate of single men is twice as high as that of married men. Single men suffer from nearly twice as many neurotic symptoms and are far more susceptible to nervous breakdowns, depression, even nightmares. And despite the all-American image of the carefree single cowboy, in reality bachelors are far more likely to be morose, passive and phobic than married men.

When contrasted with single women, unwed men fared no better in mental health studies. Single men suffer from twice as many mental health impairments as single women; they are more depressed, more passive, more likely to experience nervous breakdowns and all the designated symptoms of psychological distress - from fainting to insomnia. In one study, one third of the single men scored high for severe neurotic symptoms; only 4 percent of the single women did." "Backlash" p. 17

Huh. Serial rejection isn't good for your psyche. Who knew?

I would say expectations of partnership are different and when you aren't getting your needs met in a relationship, you are far more stressed out thus more susceptible to illness.

Most studies have shown - as you noted - that single women are happier than married women and that the opposite is true for men - married men are happiest.

I have heard all sorts of explanations, and I have my own theories, but I'm going to play Mister Rogers for Singles Awareness Day...


"Everybody's fancy.... Everybody's fine..."

except for "fake" single people. The ones who have had several live in partners during their lives and have several children and yet will pipe up and say "I have never been married"

I had another co-worker tell me that he was using his "girlfriend's" car. I said, wait a minute, I thought you had kids. He said, yeah we have two kids. And you live together, I asked. Yeah, we have lived together for four years now.

And he calls her a girlfriend, a word that signifies to me "I have been dating her for a few weeks".

I did not find that single women were happier than married women, only that they are happier than single men.

An average single woman though, has perhaps not been rejected by many men, but on the other hand, has probably rejected a few suitors.

It was especially bad in my grandparents' generation who were born in the 1890s.
Men were literally helpless. I saw my grandmother wait on two husbands who could not feed themselves. She bullied them into being invalids.

They couldn't wash dishes, couldn't take care of a kid, or change a diaper.

I think a lot of guys now are raised by mommas that wait on them. Then they expect a woman to come along and cook their food and wait on them. A lot of women have full time jobs and don't have time and expect a grown man to be able to feed himself and wash his clothes.

My sister was married to a guy in the 70s who told her she couldn't go to Europe with her girlfriend. She went anyway. I asked her, "What does he think is gonna happen if you are gone for two weeks? Is he gonna be lying dead on the kitchen floor, starved to death, because he is 40 years old and can't feed himself? With the cats licking him?"

:rofl:

My first husband's mother would bring him over fried chicken whenever he didn't like what I'd cooked. Which was anytime a vegetable or anything other than bacon, Pop-tarts, fried chicken or steak was served.

All of my kids can cook. Too many parents do baby their kids of both genders.

I worry about people who lack self-sufficiency.

Happy VDSA Day, Manifestor_of_Light, and may someone cook you a lavish meal and then ravish you in the most sublime and progressive way!



:hi:

unless they are still living at home, or make enough money to always eat out and hire people to clean their house and do their laundry (as in Charlie from "2.5 Men")

We should change it!

I thought bachelors had a ball! That monogamy did not suit the nature of men, or some such thing.

One can get solace and support in life without having a "life partner" in fact breaking up with the life partner for example is a lead cause of the need for solace and support. They don't seem to be getting that. Economies of scale are not that large for one versus two, and single people can have roommates if that is an issue.

of course.

I am married, but there is joy in being single, if the individual can embrace it. I don't presume everyone wants to be married or in a relationship. Some people are quite happy pursuing their interests on their own without the diversion of a family, and for them it works.

I like the idea on another GD thread--just spread love today with a bigger tip, a warm smile, or with a favor done.

Didn't see the thread but I totally agree...

This is HUGH!1!!!!

What a sweetie you are :smooch:

I bought a pipe wrench which weighs almost as much as I do but also makes tightening the fittings much easier. My shoulders were yelling at me this morning, but then I reminded them how heavy the water is - that the pump will now "carry" for them - and they shut up...;)

:hi:

i wish I could give you each ten hearts.

And I've seen Kingofalldems handing out Valentines so if anyone can, the King might need some extras...



:loveya: :loveya: :loveya: :loveya: :loveya: :loveya: :loveya:

Love is grand but self-determination is the grandest.

May romance visit you, xchrom, in the finest ways possible :loveya:

usually i don't know his name -- and it's never very noble.

but it's fun!:evilgrin:

i can relate with the gratitude

:evilgrin:

had a wonderful partner who enough like me.
he died -- oh years ago now -- but that was enough for me.

i'm not young and stuck in my {loose moral} ways.

i would rather be alone than lonely in a marriage.

And I don't like having to take care of anyone right now...I spent my life at that and i need some relief..


I never say never, but i enjoy singleness too much to change it....

it's better to be alone and lonely, than to be
with someone and still be lonely. I much prefer
my own company than to have to put up with those
who do not understand.

It's true we "let" others influence our emotions this way.

Living alone is a way to avoid that influence at all.

Some people keep relationships going with the old: "Live close by; visit often."

Yay to running water!

And a big old :hug: for you.

I have some leaks to tighten (that's when I miss having one of the sons here or a guy around - they always handled the cutting and priming and wrenching of pipes) but there is water and I wired it correctly cuz I'm not crispy fried.

Yay to running water indeed. The horses have been nagging me as I walk back and forth in front of them on my way back and forth to the pump house. They have kept me focused :D

A :hug: back atcha and some Valentine's/Singles Awareness Cheer to Thou :toast:

And a nice, cool toast to ya :toast:

The Hallmark/FTD Profit Day!

Restaurants/Bakeries/Hotels/Liquor Stores and preachers (marrying all those silly marry-ers)


It's a big day for a lot of folks. But the best Valentine is the one you make yourself...

or the one you get on DU



Happy VD/SA Day, walldude :hi:


may romance blossom in the walldude abode...

You are FABULOUS and you deserve a lot of chocolate.

And if you wait til tomorrow, it will all be on sale


:hug:

May Cupid bless you with romance or, alternatively, may the Singles Fairy shower you with fountains of sparkles and heart-shaped happiness.

:hi: