The Joy of Singlehood (George mention again!)

It's funny the way they always mention George in this type of thing...like many people including myself (married for 13 years) he was married and divorced and decided not to get married again so what!

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The joy of singlehood

Just look to George Clooney as an example of a happy single. Indeed, he is so content in his bachelorhood that four years ago he bet Michelle Pfeiffer £50,000 that he’d never again tie the knot.

Come February, with Valentine’s Day and Family Day packed into the shortest month of the year, it’s tough for those who are single or childless to avoid the message that they’ve missed the boat.

Which is ironic, given the demographic shift to singledom of the last few decades. It’s influencing consumption, health care, the environment and other social issues but is largely being ignored as society continues to focus on family and kids. So says Bella DePaulo, a visiting professor of psychology at the University of California at Santa Barbara and author of most recently of Single With Attitude: Not Your Typical Take on Health and Happiness, Love and Money, Marriage and Friendship (CreateSpace). “Singles are no longer marking time until the day they become unsingle,” says DePaulo. “They’re pursuing their passions, nurturing friendships and creating nets of people they care about and who care about them.”

Today, some 30 per cent of households in Canada are occupied by singles. By 2026 it is expected to reach almost 40 per cent. Globally, the story is much the same.

And childlessness is growing as well: In the early 1970s, about one in 10 women in much of the developed world had never had a child. Today, in the U.S. Canada and a number of other developed countries, the ratio has reached one in five, a result of expanding economic and reproductive choices for women. Moreover, more young people are delaying leaving the nest and putting off having children (and the longer they leave it, the less likely they ever will).

“I never played with baby dolls. I played with Barbie dolls, and they had very interesting careers and very interesting sex lives but they didn’t have children,” says Diane Forrest, a financial-services communications specialist in her early 50s. “I just don’t think that instinct is very well developed in me, and I think that’s true of a lot of people.”

Forrest is happy to be of a generation where her choices about marriage and children were within her control. For her, that meant no kids but does include a long-term boyfriend — and separate residences. She lives near the Don Valley; he lives near High Park. “We’re the first generation of women who really, really had choices,” she says. “There were a lot of obstacles, but basically we could do what we wanted and I was very conscious of that growing up.”

But still, that cliché of a childless life being an empty one is hard to shake. “Sometimes when I’m reading obituaries and I read about a childless, unmarried woman, I think ‘Oh my God, that’s so sad,’” says Forrest. “And then I think ‘Wait a minute, that’s me!’ ”

Dave Atkinson, 42, of Port Credit, is unmarried and childless, a choice driven mostly by a desire to travel, which he does six months a year. It’s not a life that makes long-term relationships easy. It’s also not a life of luxury: He operates a one-man window and eavestrough cleaning company six months of the year, working 12-hour days and living in a modestly furnished bachelor apartment. Then, come winter, out comes his 28-litre backpack and he’s off.

Is that selfish? Not, at all, he says, without apology. “Selfish means you’re doing something for your benefit to the detriment of others. If I choose not to have kids, that’s not about being selfish, it’s just about being a realist. I like ’em but I don’t want them. It’s more self-absorbed than selfish really.”

Not all childless singles are quite so secure in voicing their status, though research suggests that more than half of all singles are not looking for a committed relationship. “Single people who really like their lives feel reluctant to say so because they’re wary of getting the response that ‘You’re fooling yourself’ or ‘There’s something wrong with you,’” says DePaulo. “So they moderate their response: They say they’re not looking right now because that’s more socially acceptable.”

The prevalence of anti-single stereotypes doesn’t help — for example, friends and family will suggest that an individual who says he or she is happily single “must have issues,” says DePaulo. “Can you imagine saying to a married person, ‘What’s wrong with you? Why are you so dependent?’ ”

If you’re a woman, says DePaulo, you’re stereotyped as either a promiscuous party girl who no one will marry or a sad sack who can’t get a date. If you’re male, you’re either a slob living in your parents’ basement, a closeted homosexual or a potential child predator.

In a 2008 study examining voting patterns, the U.S. Pew Research Center presented respondents with four candidates: two woman, one with children the other without; and two men, one with children and one without. The man without children scored the fewest votes, the man with children the most. The women occupied the middle ground.

Or how about the U.S. study of health-care workers that found singles admitted to hospital received lower quality care than patients surrounded by family. The respondents admitted they presumed the singles weren’t worthy of the same level of care because they weren’t surrounded by loved ones.

Nor do all singles get access to the advantages that come with being coupled. Health insurance and pension benefits often offer fewer options, and of course an individual travelling alone pays more.

There is an upside, though. Singles tend to have more money, especially if they’re childless. According to a 2009 study of older Americans, single, childless men have as much as one-third more wealth than their peers; unmarried childless women were one-third more wealthy than their counterparts.

The full impact of singlehood may have yet to be felt, says DePaulo, as singles grow old. Dave Atkinson and Diane Forrest are already planning for that day. He is socking away money to buy a small rural property, though he’ll keep travelling as long as possible. Forrest says she’s conscious of having strong relationships with younger people in her life because one day she’ll need them. But that doesn’t preclude hatching plans with old friends.

“I have a couple of friends who are in a similar situation to me and we’re talking about what we call the Old Broad’s Home,” she says. “The idea is that we’ll buy a fourplex and get some university student to live in the basement and plow the snow and stuff like that. And if we have guys at the time, we might let them come along too.”

“People are making plans that centre on the people who are important to them,” says DePaulo, “to move to the same city or the same neighbourhood or to share a big house. We’re seeing more experiments in living. It’s hard to track, but it’s there.”

And by the time Forrest is ready for her Old Broad’s Home, perhaps February’s celebration of lovers and families will be joined by a third, a day focused on friends.

four years ago he bet Michelle Pfeiffer £50,000 that he’d never again tie the knot.

a bit old, no?

I love my kids but if I were in my 20-30 today, I wouldn't have children and I rethink the whole wedding vows and contract before signing on the dotted line.IF you had to do it over how many wouldn't do it differently? Besides it's to expensive to raise children in this day and age.Why the heck should George marry,he doesn't need to.

Absolutely Lucy!