Are you single? Make it large!

I now view relationships unfold from the outside rather than the inside. That's the difference between being married and being single.

Looking at my blog posts from a few years back just takes me back to a different life. What masala! I would love to read sex-in-the-city-ish posts like that today. Does anybody write stuff like that in the mainstream media? I'm discounting Shobhaa De's pretentious column on Mumbai Mirror which I doubt any non-socialite would relate to. Did you read Why Sarojben matters more than Jashodaben where De talks about the middle class from this lens of "Oh this is what others go through"? Most of De's content relies on second hand experiences of middle class people seen by the lady living the good life. We need some real middle class women talking about life in the city. Newspapers and magazines, are you listening? *Grin*

But look what's happened to me now! All the masala I know of is happening in other people's lives. Crushes, heartbreaks, fights, reluctance, being unsure, drama, breaking up, making up, making out - I am only a listener. And it has majorly dented the amount of content I'm able to generate. Lol.

But since I'm in reflection mode, I've been trying to put it all in perspective here. Based on (aforementioned) second hand experiences, what is life like when you're single and 30 - man or woman? Dude, its loads and loads of fun!

Lifestyle
At 30, you've crossed the stage where you were making just about adequate money and are usually into the big bucks. Since you don't have a spouse and/ or children, you have a huge savings surplus that you spend on the good life. Booze, parties, great food, more booze, holidays, movies, more booze, friends, dates, more booze. And then some more booze.

Dating
From time to time, you meet someone who you are desperately trying to fit into your specific requirements for a partner. More often than not, no matter how hard you try and no matter how much you try to convince yourself, there's that nagging feeling that this just cannot be the one. At 30, you can find faults with everybody. EVERYBODY. But that means that you meet new people all the time. You're constantly evaluating - your mind's working full time! And gaining mind blowing experience that you just can't get anywhere else.

Work
Even though you work more, you actually work less. Coz when you're single, work stops at the workplace. Then you're back home and it's just your life. No planning for lunches and dinners, no buying stuff based on multiple family member requirements and (this is the biggest one of all) just one family to cater to. When you're married, your family doubles instantly and now you need to speak to all parties on the phone, remember double the number of birthdays and anniversaries, buy gifts for double the occasions. Work is less when you're single. Enjoy it!

Bedroom
People with your own bedrooms will totally get this. Are you used to sleeping in a bed all by yourself? With a room full of your stuff? Kept in the places that you want them to be kept in? Cherish that! It's the place you can go to at the end of the day and think, laugh, cry, whatever. It's your space. YOUR space! God, would married people kill for that!

Friends
You don't have to go for that chick flick (or that movie with subtitles). You can spend as much time as you want with your friends doing the things that you like. Sleepovers, late night drives, last minute plans, pub-hopping - all with your safe bunch of people by your side. Whenever you want, without checking with your spouse's time table or (like in my case) with your cook if she has already prepared your dinner or not!

Single and 30. Forget the peer pressure. You're living the life you couldn't live when you were in your early 20s and won't be able to live when you're 40. Make it large!

Solitude

When was the last time you wished for solitude? Before a few days back, I can't think when. Most of last year, I have been wishing to overcome single-hood. I have looked around, dated a bit, been disappointed in the worst ways possible. cried in my weakest moments, punched in my strongest...! It's pretty much been a roller-coaster of emotions for me.

Pan camera to the last few days. Note my daily schedule:
06:00 - Wake up
08:00 - Breakfast
08:15 - Move ass out of hotel and walk to work
08:30 - At desk, laptop open, work begins
17:30 (on an average, not counting the day I left at 20:00) - Walk back to hotel
17:45 - In room, changing clothes
18:00 - In hotel restaurant reading a book
19:30 - Dinner
20:30 - TV or movie on laptop
22:30 - Sleep

My interactions with people are limited to people at work, the hotel receptionists, the restaurant stewards and stewardesses and the occasional old man asking me if I'm wearing Coco Chanel! Oh and of course, the countless people I smile and say hello to, everywhere I go - hotel, streets, office, bus, wherever. On the weekend, I went to Brussels and walked the streets with nothing but a map, some cigarettes, my passport and cash. I saw couples in love, kids having fun and old people generally chilling. I ate waffles bought from the street and heard live music in almost every alley in the heart of the city.

And I'd have thought that all this should make someone want to have company even more. But it didn't. Quite the contrary in fact. I love spending entire evenings doing nothing but reading my books and drinking the occasional beer alongside. It's such a welcome change from the long working hours that lead to a need for bouts of drinking (stress can really make you want to unwind with a drink) that leads to lesser sleep that leads to crappy mornings that leads to not wanting to work the long hours of the week. I feel better, I'm finishing my books in record speed and I don't go to bed thinking what my future is going to be like. Simply because my present is so relaxing! No tension, no concern, no stress. I sometimes find myself looking for more work to do (unlike how I hated waking up in the mornings to get to work back home) and I cannot say enough on how I love the hotel room all to myself! Nobody to ask what I'm doing, why I'm not eating, what are my plans for the day, whether I'll be home for dinner, who's on the phone or who I'm meeting in the evening. I don't want to make my parents seem like monsters, because they're not. They're the most understanding people on the planet (well in some ways at least), but some irrelevant nuances get very annoying when you have to deal with them everyday. And I'm sure somewhere deep down, they feel the same way about me as well. I am SO difficult at times, I wonder how they keep their cool.

Coming back to the point, I find that the constant push for me to excel in a field that I don't care much about breaks me back home. Not that I'm doing anything different here, but that push isn't there. I'm not expected to work a long week in lieu for a life to myself. I sometimes wonder if I did the right thing by taking back my old job. I wasn't making enough money writing, but should I have tried harder? I'd sure have loved 10 hrs of writing a day rather than 10 hrs of rationalizing application landscapes!!!

I picked up a book from the hotel bar yesterday and reading it made me feel like getting back to writing. All I need is inspiration, and working where I am today, gives me none. Back home, all I want to do at the end of the day is to talk about anything but work, or better still, not talk at all. And I don't get to do that. Most days I come home to a phone call from work, asking for more work to be done. And that's because that's just how it works in Mumbai if your employer has given you a laptop. Time to yourself....what is that?

That is solitude.

And I'm loving every bit of it.