Dancing With Yourself

86: Percentage of young adults who believe marriage is hard work and a full-time job.

82: Percentage of young adults who say it's unwise for women to rely on marriage for financial security.

SOURCE: National Marriage Project, 2001

Invariably every Valentine's day I hear the plaint from a single friend (or 'plain, myself, upon occasion): where is the holiday for us single folk?  When's the Un-Valentine's Day wherein we can celebrate the dubious distinction of being unattached?

Well, it's been done, of course, it's already out there.  A certain enterprising young writer has not only planted her flag on this turf, she's attempted to colonize the entire territory.   Welcome to International Quirkyalone Day (visit this webpage to find a celebration near you), the invention of Sasha Cagen, who a few years back patented "Quirkyalone."

I first came upon the term in this recent article from the Boston Globe, which is chockful of interesting statistics and thoughts on the current single life and worth a good skim (you have to get past some Boston-centricity, but it has universal applications).  The article chronicles those of us who have taken a kind of benign but determined stand against the Tyranny of Coupledom, and currently being a curmudgeonly bachelor, I'm happy to report that we are evidently a growing force in the culture.

Cagen defines Quirkyalone (on the homepage for her website of same) as:

...a person who enjoys being single (but is not opposed to being in a relationship) and generally prefers to be alone rather than date for the sake of being in a couple.

Cool!  Let's hear it for happy loners!  Nice to have a flag to wave in the often infuriatingly smug face of young moms and dads who roll their strollers over your feet when you're settled into The Good Table at the cafe with only a book for companionship.  And if you'd like to learn whether you truly qualify, here's a handy quiz to answer the question, Are You a Quirkyalone?

Cagan's word is all well and good, to a point, except that there's a sneaky subtext in all this.  Read further into the Quirkyalone literature (Cagen has a book out on the concept, natch, and there's this one and now this one in what's fast becoming another self-help niche) and you discover that Cagen and her followers are actually just Extremely Picky Single Romantics Who Are Holding Out For Their Soulmates.

Kind of goes against the inherent spirit of the thing, doesn't it?  Your archetypal Quirkyalonester seems more like a classic romantic comedy protagonist -- the guy or girl who's like, totally convinced there's no such thing as one true love... until Love walks in and high jinks ensue.  Essentially a Quirkyalone is just a radically soppy romantic in doth-protest-too-much drag.

I get the self-helpist positivity here -- the idea that too many romantic relationships are contrived compromises that keep people from being lonely (until they find out that there's nothing more lonely than being in a relationship that doesn't quite work), and thus it's smart and brave to forego anything but the absolute Real Deal. 

Still, that's a lot different from being a true iconoclast, or dedicated cynic, or... well, a regular old Loner who understands all too well just what kinds of sacrifices and scarrings that committed relationships can yield, and thus chooses to opt out of the whole game of love.

There's also the irony inherent in the Quirkyalone community, which is kind of oxymoronic.  Sasha Cagen and her acolytes are clearly not from the Alvy Singer school of "don't want to belong to any club that would have me as a member," and so ultimately, how quirky and how alone can these supposedly single-minded people be?  Cagen's website and chat room have tacitly come to resemble, in fact, an internet matchmaking service.

And possibly one reason I've been late in catching up with this term is that it's... not very catchy.  Actually it's not very good, is it?  Quirky is fast becoming a kind of generic non-word anyway (it's neck-in-neck with attractive as the most useless descriptive adjective in contemporary screenwriting).  Sasha's made-up word lacks the simple pull of the British singleton.  But marriagefree, as cited in the Globe article, has too politico-agitprop a vibe and suffers from that "defining yourself by what you're opposed to" problem.  So there seems to still be a gap in the contemporary venacular, despite Ms. Cagen's grab for lexicionical posterity.

I think we need a new word, so I throw it to you guys.  What might be another good term for "happy to be single unless one-in-a-million love lightning strikes"?

In the meantime, I leave you with one of my favorite poems, one that celebrates a far less romantic state of singledom, getting right to the painful existential core of the matter, with a wonderful frisson of tender misanthropy in its closing that's typical of its author, the sadly sardonic Philip Larkin.  Here, I suggest, is a manifesto for the truly Alone, those who have opted out of the whole mating and procreating game.

This Be The Verse

They fuck you up, your mum and dad

They may not mean to, but they do.

They fill you with the faults they had

And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn

By fools in old-style hats and coats,

Who half the time were soppy-stern

And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man

It deepens like a coastal shelf.

Get out as early as you can,

And don't have any kids yourself.

Comments

[Chris Soth]

Well, Woody as Alvy was quoting Julius as Groucho, lest we forget...

cbs

[binnie]

I think the holiday for "us single folk" is every day! Having grown up in a very contentious household, and feeling thankful when my constantly-fighting parents divorced, there is at times something calm and welcoming about the solitude. MY house, MY rules, so it stays very peaceful here. I hate all the drama (and I know many people who confuse drama with passion). Which is not to say that I don't wish to be in a truly passionate relationship, but being alone (i.e., not being involved with a "significant other". I do have a wide and very involving circle of friends) does not mean being miserable.
"Quirky" is such a silly word; I much prefer the more flowery "fancy free", which according to Random House actually means "free from any influence, especially that of love".

[JJ]

How about "Finealones"?

I have noticed that every ensuing generation since the boomers has had less to do with marriage and forced coupling.

My parents had several sets of married friends who couldn't stand one another. But they had to get married because that's what you did. You went college, got a job and a wife, and started wearing cartigan sweaters.

My daughters both seem to make a funny face and ditch a boy the minute he starts acting like, well, a boy.

But it's not so much that these people want to be alone as that they would rather enjoy their friends than fight with their lovers.

I think if you knew ahead of time how much work a marriage and kids are, the race would just die out.

[E.C. Henry]

Very though provoking post, Billy.

Guess I fit the bill of a "quirkyaloner", though that's hardly a distincition I want or would use to characterize someone else. Not a day goes by that I don't wish I had that someone special in my life. Heck, I've even tried an on-line service to improve the odds. Defiantly think men and women need to hook-up, and that we weren't meant to live alone.

Guess the person who spiked my punch bowl was my father. According to Eric Sr. men are the buck and females are the does, and it's the buck's job to provide the doe with strengh and secuturity she needs to build her nest.

Since I've had god-awefull low paying job, after god-awefull low paying job I fingured I diddn't fit that bill.

Hopefully someday that'll change, and I'll meet that someone special, get married, and ditch the dubious distinction of being a "quickyalone". Untill then, blonde, brunette, red head -- I love 'em all!! Cause when you're 37 and single, its time to show some flexibilty and be willing to swing to the right or left.

- E.C. Henry from Bonney Lake, WA

[MaryAn]

disengaged

[Chris]

free radicals

[mernitman]

Chris: ...which means...? He was actually a member of a club?

Binnie: Yes to all that, but still -- if couples get a holiday, why not we fancy frees?

JJ: Finealone is certainly better than quirky, and more apropos. And BTW, you and Phil Larkin woulda got along just fine...

E.C. -- best of luck in your quest...

MaryAn: that's perfect.

Chris: That's apt... but apt to get us into trouble ;-)

[binnie]

Well, in that case, Happy Fancy Freedom Day!

[chesher cat]

(Duh, I posted this comment on the wrong post...it belongs here...I think...)

In honor of your post, I played hooky this afternoon and went to see The Lake House...UGH.

Happy to stay 'sanely single.'

[Bill]

Well, I kind of like the sound of "polyamorist." It may not be entirely accurate, but it has a nice ring.

Also, it has a more positive spin. Rather than highlighting what you do not have, it highlights what you do (or maybe hope you do). In my own definition, it's not exclusive to romantic love, which is pretty limiting and often has the life span of a gnat. But people are often on good terms with former lovers and retain a kind of love, even if not of the romantic kind, and love others to varying degrees though they may have never been lovers.

So I go for polyamorist. :-)

[Sal]

Did the quiz, am "very quirkyalone" - not much surprise there. I too like the phrase "singleton", although Fancy Free is pretty neat. Although what if you do fancy someone, but think the hassle of letting them know outweighs the potential benefits? Hmm, guess I really am very very single!

[mernitman]

Chesher: Sanely single, that sounds good... Lake House, that sounds not (the trailer definitely had that "check your brain at the door" look).

Bill: I like your polyamorist concept. I'm one, for sure.

Welcome, Sal: Ah, the old "what outweighs the potential benefits?" issue! Know it well.
I do try (die-hard romanticism) to brave such encounters anyway, since One Never Knows what might come of same, even if the rewards be fleeting...

[catherine Railton]

Dear Billy, I would propose that the realization of aloneness comes to some of us earlier and harder than to others. Some of us, stumble through life thinking that some relationship or another (as exciting and fabulous as it may seem at the time (aka lightning, fireworks, etc...) will deliver us from the dark reality, that in fact, we are alone. I think we talked about the fact that we never, ever know for sure whether we have been delivered from that state, although we surely crave the illusion till the day we die, that we have transcended that isolation and for a brief time, have shared another's lonely sphere. Marriage is a social construct. Children are a joy. But in the end, we never really know what has been illusion and what has been love, or maybe we do know love, but we have to quit this Hollywood notion that there are no colors of blue and black in there. "Halleluiah..." Which brings me to another place about the Leonard Cohen movie you so recently saw...

So I guess it's not a matter of commiting to singledom, as much a matter of realizing it. For some of us at least. Of course, I was raised by Didi and Gogo, so there goes romance...

[catherine Railton]

Such a dark take on aloneness and singledom, I have to refer back to the Leonard Cohen movie and his Zen humor about life/death/love. He puts things in perspective, this game we play. And he makes me think how can you possibly think after all this time you are Periphery Man, when, in fact, the center is where- you -are, and that other movie-pretending-to-be-life, called Hollywood/success is just background noise, a party (if not a very good one), an illusion. Is that blasphemous to pronounce in a screenwriting blog?

[mernitman]

Dear Catherine, It feels somehow inadequate to respond to your heartfelt missive with the usual dollop or pound of verbiage, so just picture me listening, nodding, and giving one of your shoulders a squeeze.

Your comment on perspective and where the center is doesn't strike me as blasphemous at all. It's a point well taken and one which a lot of other writers (in addition to myself) should take in and think about.

Thanks for the visit.