Single or Attached ?

by J L Leow

Here’s an old chestnut for you: the grass is always greener on the other side. Always. No matter what you apply the saying to, it’s true. It’s not a cliché for nothing, you know. In this case, what I’m talking about is –what else– the subject of getting into a relationship. It doesn’t matter if you are single or part of a couple, no matter which situation you find yourself in, occasionally you’re bound to start thinking of crossing the fence and dropping yourself into the opposite situation.

Call me crazy, but when I was girlfriend-less, I was desperate to get myself hitched. Perhaps not desperate, but itchy, at least. And once I found myself happily shackled to a girl, I began to see the merits of being single. All of a sudden, the grass on the other side had turned greener.

I don’t know if you’ve ever felt the same way. If you’re single, chances are you occasionally feel a twang of envy towards your attached friends, and if you’re attached, maybe you once in a while secretly long for the days when you belonged to nobody. There are pros and cons to either situations, of course.

Total Freedom
The pros of being single can be summed up in a single word: freedom! Freedom to watch football with your friends whenever you want, freedom to grow a mustache anytime you please, freedom to dress like a slob in public, freedom to chat up any girl you want, freedom to be free. It’s a heck of a lot easier on your pocket too, being single, because there’s less going out, less eating out, less cab fares to pay for, and no presents to buy.

On of the first things that hit me right between the eyes when I first started going out with the opposite sex was: this dating jazz is expensive. I used to rush my date home minutes before her midnight curfew, and after seeing her safely to the door, I would run out to the main road, only to find that he buses had stopped running, which meant having to take a cab home. At midnight fare, mind you. I had never been more broke in my life.

To Date Or Not To Date
The cons of being single bite you in the heart the first Friday night you encounter in which your best buddies are all out because they’re with their girlfriends, leaving you alone at home with nothing to do and nowhere to go. In which case, you just have to read magazines over and over and over. It’s not just Friday nights that sting, though. It’s fairly awful any day of the week when you’re lonely, and have no one to hold hands with but your bolster, which probably hasn’t got any hands anyway. And so, girls become and itch you have to scratch.

What are the pros of being attached? Well, that one’s fairly obvious. You always have someone there for you. There’s constantly a soft female form for you to cuddle up with on rainy days. You never have to worry on spending Saturday night by yourself. The list is long indeed. Girls are just special, in the way they laugh, the way they brighten automatically when you present them with flowers, the way they wrap your gifts with such tender loving care.

It’s a Vicious Cycle
Considering the cons of being attached brings us full circle back to the pros of being single – once situation really is just a flip-side of the other. When you’re attached, there’s less freedom, less money, and absolutely no chance of chatting up other babes, unless you fancy a black eye or a swift kick to the jingle bells.

What’s a guy to do? Beats me. If it’s true that the grass is always greener on the other side, then it means you’ll never be happy, because you’ll always be miserable on your own side. I guess you either can’t stand being single or you can’t stand being attached, which is probably why some guys remain happy bachelors for their entire lives, while others settle down as soon as they’re sure of having found the right one. Perhaps when you’ve finally pounced on the right girl, the grass just ceases to look greener on the other side anymore.

Or who knows? You might even stop peeking at the other side altogether.