...now that I have hit my 50's, singleness has become a curse. The friends I used to hang with fell by the wayside once they got married. The various aquaintences I have met since those years I really have nothing in common with. Team sports I used to participate in eventually evolved to do it on your own sports as those folks drifted away too.
Fortunately for me, athletic activity has always been a passion and has ultimately sustained me for all these years. I shudder to think what kind of an individual I would be had I not taken to sports and had to deal with living alone for so long without them.
I suspect I would have ended up like that guy you see in your favorite bar who is there till closing time night after night.
2 nights ago I received a call from my friend Ron who is also a lifetime single but at least he has a girlfriend of over 10 years. He called to inform me that one of friends of many, many years ago (Ron went to school with the guy) committed suicide this past week. What a blow to hear that! Ron said he had just talked with him a couple weeks ago and Danny was praising his business and how everything was going so well. Obviously not as well as he let on.
Anyway, Ronnie and I were lamenting the fact that neither one of us had married and had kids.
When you consider the life cycle of the family unit, our parents raised us, reveled in the success of knowing that we never ended up in jail or got killed and enjoyed the remaining years they both had together once we got out on our own. They enjoyed our family get togethers but were probably relieved to get home each evening to the peace and quiet of their own house.
As they got older and more infirm, the kids became more involved in now helping them out as much as they could. Eventually Mom and Dad both passed away leaving the kids to carry on the cycle. As for Ron and I, the cycle will stop with us as we never created families of our own.
I have 2 step-sisters who are much older than I and the law of averages predicts they will pass on before I do. When that happens, the true reality of "singleness" will become all too clear.......
Hopefully, before that happens, I will have been able to find someone to spend the remaining years of my life with.
For all of you with families, you don't know how much I envy you and for all of you who wish you were single, be very careful of what you wish for.....