Despite the fact that the dissolution of a relationship is painful and difficult, I can’t say that I mind being single again. While there are a lot of things I miss about being in a relationship, I’ll admit that I like the independence and the spontaneity that comes along with single life. I do, however, hate those moments that make me feel acutely single, and not just single, but SAD single.
Let me backtrack… There’s two kinds of single: fun, glamorous single and sad single.
Fun single is randomly deciding at 4:59pm on a Tuesday to go to happy hour with coworkers and ending up closing down the bar. Sad single is texting around on a Friday night, discovering that all your friends are busy, and after drinking an entire bottle of wine by yourself, texting them again at 1:30am to see if they just want to drop by on their way home.
Fun single is going on vacation with a bunch of other girls just because you can. Sad single is not being invited on a trip with your friends because it’s a “couple’s thing.”
Fun single is going shopping on your lunch break and splurging on a pair of ridiculously expensive and heinously uncomfortable shoes that you know you’ll wear twice, and only to places where you don’t have to walk much. You buy them anyway because you know no one’s going to ask you why when you get home. Sad single is buying the shoes for a special date night, only to realize six months later that they’re still in the back of the closet because apparently people don’t date anymore. They just text, Facebook stalk and “hang out.”
Fun single is Sex and the City. Sad single is the Cathy comic strip.
The one place where I consistently feel sad single is the grocery store. When I was in a relationship we rarely went grocery shopping together, but I never felt like I stood out. Even with all the couples that seem to love going grocery shopping together (what’s that about anyway? How many people does it take to pick up some cereal and a cantaloupe?), I never felt out of place. I’ll tell you, though, there’s absolutely nothing that says sad single more than standing in line at the grocery store with four Lean Cuisines, a few containers of yogurt, a bottle of wine, a box of Skinny Cow diet ice cream bars and a bag of cat litter. SAD SINGLE.
Consequently, when I go grocery shopping, I’m distracted. I’m hyper-aware of the contents of my basket, and of the people around me. On the bright side, this has helped me cut down on processed foods (no one can tell how many people you’re feeding when you’ve got a cart full of produce!), but on the downside, it’s caused me to make a few shopping errors.
Last week I got all the way home before I realized I’d been charged $13.89 for three pounds of deli potato salad that I didn’t buy (because what would a single girl like me do with that much potato salad anyway?). It was annoying, but totally fixable; I went right back to Kroger and got a refund. This week’s mistake was hands down, way worse.
I somehow bought single-ply toilet paper. And not the fancy stuff that’s so cushy you can’t even tell it’s just one layer. No, in an attempt to budget, I’d bought the generic brand, and now I’m stuck with four rolls of what’s essentially tissue paper. It’s seriously the thinnest damn toilet paper I’ve ever seen in my life. The kicker, though, is that even though I have to use a ton to equal something resembling a normal amount of the 2-ply stuff, the damn roll goes on FOREVER. I’ve had the same roll on all week and it’s not even shrunk. It’s like this shitty* roll of toilet paper that keeps on giving.
Now THAT is sad single.
*Am I too old to find the fact that I did this accidentally totally funny?
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