Two By Two

Most of you know by now my feelings on Valentine's Day (in summary: NOT good!) I've always had a boyfriend or husband to "celebrate" with, although that never quite seems to work out either. Eighteen disappointing V-Days in a row is what we call a losing streak. There are two ways to approach the imminent, candy coated holiday: A) Stay home and whine, hiding my face from the world, pretending the day doesn't exist or B) Do something about it!

Last year, I went out with my girlfriends for wine, cheese and gossip. They were the best company I could have asked for and it wasn't nearly as depressing as V-Days past. Felt like just another rainy Monday night in New York City where friends, food, and booze were the norm. This year, Doomsday takes place on a Tuesday (ooh, that rhymes!) and I am hosting a whole spread of pre-emptive strikes leading up to the awful occasion.

I'm super excited to host my first I Hate Valentine's Day but I Love Chocolate Passion Party. It's cupcakes and sex toys - how fun is that??? Let's face facts, ladies: when you're in a relationship, you're very generous to your lover. But when you're single, the only person pleasing you is yourself! My girlfriends deserve a chance to shop for some personal pleasures to ease the loneliness of their singlehood. (Or just make hooking up with random guys that much more exciting. No judgement!)

I'm also throwing an I Hate V-Day party with bumper bowling and bar hopping. There will be rock n roll music, laser lights, and fried food. Have to say, this probably beats out any lame, last minute date I could come up with! I get to be with other awesome people who just wanna have a good time, throw back a few drinks, knock down a few pins, and talk trash about our coupled off friends (no offense, peeps!)

The frustrating part is that some of my coupled off friends (who shall remain nameless) want to come to the Bowling for Singles party. Yes, it's going to be awesome but I'm afraid that having them there defeats the purpose of unattached people having a Friday night comfort zone. Every time one half of the couple gets a strike, they're gonna start making out in a congratulatory fashion and I might have to kill them.

Plus, my cousin pointed out this fact: "I can't go away on vacation to a Sandals or a Beaches or one of those couples only resorts so they don't get to come to rock n bowl with booze and cupcakes. There are plenty of occasions I am invited to with a date - weddings and all that bull shit - and people look at you funny if you don't have a boyfriend. This is the one time I'm encouraged to come without a date. They don't get to rub their twosomes in our face. Sorry."

She's completely right. Think about it! The world is made for twosomes. Right from the start of creation, Noah told the animals to get on the ark two by two. The zebras, the giraffes, the elephants. I can't help thinking that the poor little unicorn got stood up at the last minute (likely because her unicorn boyfriend was passed out drunk in the woods) and she literally missed the boat, obliterating her from existence for all eternity.

What about animals that didn't have partners? What about the one-offs? The singles? They couldn't pro-create so they just got left behind? The creatures who couldn't find their perfect match had front row seats to the wrath of God, getting washed away by the flood? If this isn't motivation to "settle down" then I don't know what is.

We feel the pressure to couple off coming from every direction. It's in the books we read, the movies we watch, our family's pitying faces, the facebook statuses we wish we could hide. People happy in their relationships, making more and more babies, living their wonderful lives with their wonderful new families. I do NOT begrudge anyone their happiness. You will vividly recall my own nauseating updates about being blissfully involved with a man I thought held my future in his hands. I wanted all those things with him and am still convinced that I will have them someday (with a man far, far more deserving of me.) In the meantime, I want to celebrate my single-dom for the first time in my adult life.

Here's the thing: with each passing hour, each passing day, I break a new record for the longest time I've ever been single. I have been going into, involved with, or coming out of a relationship since I was fifteen years old. Even throughout this project, I've always had a date (or twelve) lined up. There was no time for girlfriends, no time for ME. This Valentine's Day is not about fighting the system, going against the grain, or resenting couples who have found their other half. It's about celebrating being single and since Hallmark has yet to assign a day for that, we are taking one over for ourselves.

I am a unicorn: sparkly, beautiful, magical and mysterious. Just because I haven't met another unicorn yet does not mean that the world gets to leave me behind. It means that the boat isn't leaving until I get on it.