When you see this^ pop up on your OkCupid account it’s like when you’re grandma impatiently taunts you, “well?” during a conversation of your relatives husbands/children. It’s like that sinking feeling you get when yet another engagement/wedding/birth announcement pops up on your FaceBook newsfeed. You know, the ones you quickly scroll by, maybe “accidentally” not clicking “like” as you move onto the next post. It’s not true, though. Of the 2,776 questions that you can currently answer on OkCupid, I skipped a bunch and I’ve *only* answered about half of them over the years. My birthday is getting closer. This is the first year it hit me that this means I’m getting closer to turning 30. This birthday also means I’ve been single for nearly 4 years now. I sat in a bar with some coworkers in their 30’s the other night. Some are married, some in relationships, and some single. I asked them to reassure me that being in your 30’s isn’t so bad compared to your 20’s. That there are things to look forward to in your 30’s. I got a lot of “uhh.” One guy told me “Well, in your 20’s you go into everything more. You love harder, you fight harder, you-” but he got off when a coworker in their early to mid-twenties laughed, “I like that you said ‘you love harder’ first” and the conversation moved on.

It feels like the older I get the less options there are. The less people in my age-range not already spoken for. The less time to decide if I want to have children. The less time to do things I have the energy to do with someone else. The less time to enjoy being in a relationship with someone else and decide if we should get married or have children. The less time to look youthfully attractive. And well, just less time in general for anything, if I were to live into old age. There is plenty I enjoy about being single, especially being an introvert and needing time on my own to recharge and all. There are a lot of things I’d miss. There are moments of heartbreak I can remember that at that time I’d tell you weren’t worth feeling for having loved. But after a while all of that fades and maybe it’s just due to human nature and chemicals and impulses in ones brain that bring back the craving of ditching single life, but I’m back to being dissatisfied with my love life, and I’ve grown extra picky from my experiences.

My update on single life? I went to some museums and zoos on my own because I wanted to prove to myself that I didn’t need to be in a relationship to do those kinds of things. I did my makeup thinking, “Maybe I’ll bump into someone on the train and some Hollywood-type love story will ensue.” It didn’t. Upon arriving at my destination I promptly realized everyone else is either with their significant other or their children and every turn I just kept hearing this whisper, “You’re single, huh?” …I’m also going through a jar of pickles a week. (Lack Of Dates = Lack Of Reasons To Avoid Bad Breath.) …I’ve given my number to two guys from various dating sites/apps recently. I knew very little about one of them, so without high expectations of potential, the lack of motivation caused me to sort of flake out on him. The other guy started up one of those really out-there and silly kind of conversations with me, so I played along without having anything better to do. He tells a lot of dry jokes. I thought I could put up with it until he uploaded a new photo and this conversation followed a few days later while I was out with some coworkers for happy hour…
Myself: “What’s today?!”
Coworker: “Thursday”
Myself: “Oh.”
Coworker: “Why?”
Myself: “I was sort of supposed to go on a date at 6pm.”
Coworker: “What?! You’re standing him up?!”
Myself: “No, no. We didn’t set a place, so it doesn’t count. I wouldn’t stand someone up.”
Coworker: “He’s probably waiting somewhere with flowers!”
Myself: “Waiting where?! We didn’t have a place. He would have checked in by now if the plans were still on, and I didn’t check in because I kind of lost interest.”
Coworker: “Then why were you going to meet him in the first place?”
Myself: “Well, I agreed to before he put up a new picture and I saw he had a gap between his teeth and-“
Coworker: “You’re so shallow!”
Myself: “No, I know. It is shallow. But I can’t help it, I just wasn’t really attracted to him anymore. I mean on some people that’s fine, but in the picture it just wasn’t on him and-“
Coworker: “So shallow.”
Myself: “It is but he also told bad jokes which didn’t help and if I’m not attracted to him, I’m not and how’s that supposed to work?!”
Coworker: “So why were you going to meet him?”
Myself: “I don’t know, to see what he’s like, maybe I’d be swayed another way. I don’t know him in person so I figured I’d give it a shot.”
…But I didn’t, and I guess he didn’t really mind either.