the cool aunt!

when there's an inkling that i am missing something by not having kids i can go and spend some time with someone else's kids.  there are hordes of them in the circles of people around me...from neighbors to friends to those kids that are actually related to me!  you must know that i love kids, but i also have a pretty realistic understanding of what it means to have them in your life 24/7.  my sister has three kids--yes, she moved beyond man to man to the zone defense as my brother in law likes to say.  i actually lived at her house for a couple of months just after number two was born, so i know what it's like to wake up when they wake up and never have a moment to yourself until they go to bed again.  i know you moms out there know more intimately what i am talking about, and i appreciate you all the more for having a bit of understanding.  with all that said, i am completely content with being the cool aunt!  i get to drop in for the fun times like birthdays and holiday and bring presents and candy and get to leave before the sugar rush wears off!!!  i also get to pass on the poop filled diapers, but be first in line to guest star in the role of bedtime story teller!  i also get to have my secrets with the kiddos that their parents never have to know--with number 1 it's that i love her all the way to the moon and back (see the book guess how much i love you!)  i bring my computer which allows us to take pictures and record us singing, which they get so excited about.  i am also the first to volunteer to them them on a walk on the beach...just us!  but then when it's all over they go home with their parents and i go home to my house and live my life remembering the good times we had together and planning the things we will do the next time we get together.

Don't be single next Autumn!

i hereby publicly confess that i have signed up for many a dating website thinking that i might find the partner of my dreams there.  i am not going to divulge which ones...at least not yet, but i will confess that i have tried more than one.  but recently i have deactivated my last one, as i just felt it was time.  don't get me wrong...i have friends who are happily married thanks to these very websites, but for me it was time to say goodbye.  it is quite difficult to sever the last connection...and they have whole marketing staffs that try to convince you that you have made the wrong decision by not renewing your account with them.  in the most recent email i recived  from one of the aforementioned sites, i was being informed that their autumn sale was about to end.  and they had the gaul to tell me, "Don't be single next Autumn!"  what's so bad about being single in autumn...i mean it's not like being single in the spring is any better or worse.  and how did it become their job to put a timeline on when i should get married or not.  would they rather me settle for someone not compatible just so i won't be single next autumn.  in reality their marketing scheme is way off...they really should be encouraging me to keep playing the field.  the longer i am single, the longer i will subscribe to their site...right?!?  well, i guess we are not on the same wave length.  but no worries, because i am not going to fall for their marketing schemes...and low and behold if i am still single next autumn (which chances are i will be) i am going to celebrate!

single isn't being alone

i just got back from a weekly get together that has been reoccurring in my life for over a year.  it's a small group from church.  and no matter how you feel about church, i am sure you can understand the concept of having a place where you belong.  that may be in your family, at your work, the local bar, the country club...typically people have a place that they can think of where at a time in their lives they felt known.  it's a longing in our hearts to know and to be known.  one of the reasons that shows like cheers and friends were so appealing to us...because week after week we had this glimpse of people who were living in community and invited us to be a part of it.  at different times in my life i have experienced this to differing degrees: growing up in the neighborhood, youth group in high school, summer staff in college, living as an ex-pat in europe, my cohort in graduate school...  but i have to say that the longest standing experience has been the small group i am a part of right now.  we have dinner together and then dig into some conversation.  in the beginning i was the only single person, but now i am one of three.  but we are all under 35 and eager to be in community together...to be each other's people.  i was walking out the door while in a conversation with someone when it hit me that this is what it's about.  we were talking about direction and how sometimes it's difficult to discern when i spoke my mind and challenged (gently, of course) the person i was talking to about rethinking or reframing the issue.  that's what it's about...to celebrate and challenge and love and refine each other.  it's not always easy...in fact i would say living in community with people is messy...but it's good.  and it means that being single isn't being alone!

my home

i have a house...it's my own house...i own it!  i always thought that i would buy my first house after i got married.  every since i moved to baton rouge, i have had my eye out for the perfect house.  a couple years ago i was hours too late to put an offer on what was a really cute house.  but it was all in God's timing.  last fall i became fed up with sending someone else a check every month for my rent...money that would never come back to me...and decided that buying a house would be a good next step.  so after looking for a few months, i found my house!  i have to admit that upon first glance, it didn't blow me out of the water.  the front shrubs were overgrown, it was cold inside, and one of the rooms had some really weird paint on the walls...plus the bathroom was so small and claustrophobic!!  but my heart changed and it became my house on an early morning in late January.  remember, i said the bathroom was small...so shortly after the house became mine came a search for the all important contractor.  well, let's just say that i may have chosen the wrong one.  things look fine (not great) but they took a lot (by months) longer than i had hoped...but mission accomplished, I now have a bigger bathroom!  i can't imagine how unhappy i would be by now if i had stayed in my apartment.  it was small and not in the greatest neighborhood and far away from my friends...okay, not that far but definitely not within walking distance.  all this to say, i have a house!  pretty awesome in my opinion and not something that i ever expected to do as a single person...gotta love that!

can you believe someone said that to me?!?

so i have had this idea for a while now and since i woke up way early and can't go back to sleep i thought now is a good a time as ever.  i was chatting online the other day and someone asked me what was wrong with me.  i had told the person i was single and in my early thirties and a professional and their response communicated that there must be something broken or not working or out of order!  i was slightly taken aback by the comment, but then realized that i often do the same to my fellow single comrades.  i remember when i first moved here, the talk of my new friends was this pretty awesome guy.  he was single, successful, service minded, and just all around cool...anyway, we would dwell on the possibilities of why a guy like that would still be single.  we put him in the same box that this person put me the other day...the box that says there must be something wrong!  it's the same box that is left over from a garage sale and gets given away to charity--not a fun place to be!  i know plenty of people who are married and broken or out of order...being "not broken" is not a requisite for being married.  but also, is being married the end all and be all for all people.  can we single people not have a full life as well?  don't get me wrong, i am not saying that i want to be single for the rest of my life, but i am not going to put my life on hold until i am married or moreover in order to chase someone down to marry.  so here's to a blog that explores some of the above more in depth, that is a place to chronicle the single life of a single woman in her early thirties, that serves as a place to vent some of the comments that people make about the single life, and a place to disprove the comment that has even come from my own lips...there must be something wrong if he/she's still single!