Coupledom

Ricky is a hand-holder. Literally. He says that he thinks it would be weird for us to walk down the street together and not hold hands. In fact, the only time we don’t hold hands on the street is when one of us (usually me) is mad at the other. I asked him recently if we held hands because it physically feels good or because it sends the message to the outside world that we are a couple. He pondered it for a moment and decided it was mostly for appearances. Maybe that should bother me but it doesn't.  We have plenty affectionate moments when there's no one around to see.  But the reality is, our relationship is not just about us, it’s about the people around us, too.

I have a close friend who has just celebrated her 4th wedding anniversary. Over the past five or six years in our group of friends, she has been one of the few in a long-term relationship. I’ve always teased her for her obvious yearning to have her closest friends find lasting partners as well. As much as I’ve always admired her relationship with her husband, I always felt a bit sorry for her, too. Being the last single gal might suck, but being the first married lady didn’t seem too fun either. Maybe it’s my age, or my sweet boyfriend or a combination of the two, but I now find myself with the same yearning. I love mine and Ricky’s romantic date nights, but I daydream of double dates. A friend of his dropped by our place with his new girlfriend a few weekends ago, and I was so excited that within 10 minutes I tried to get them to commit to going out with us the following weekend. Maybe I came on too strong, because when the next weekend came they were nowhere to be found.

Overall, my friends and I have been behind the “settling down” curve. So much so, that at one point I blamed my friends for my being single. My rationale being something about there not being any peer pressure or influence to make me more receptive to a relationship. Like it was some contagious condition. But for whatever reason, over the past year, the pairing up in my crowd has begun in earnest. Of the two single girlfriends of mine who I went out manhunting with the most a year and a half ago, one is now engaged and the other is living with her boyfriend with whom she is completely in love. Yet another friend has a relatively new but serious boyfriend who has already told her he wants to marry her.  And I love that. I love that we can commiserate about commitment anxiety and bliss and make plans together as couples.

The flip side of that is the investment I feel in my friends’ decisions about who they date. I’ve always cared about wanting to like my friends’ boyfriends, but now it means more than ever. I suppose it’s because now folks are playing for keeps. Am I really going to have to deal with some blowhard at every social gathering for the foreseeable future because my friend thinks he’s The One? Will my friendships suffer because of our choices in long term partners? Maybe some of my friends secretly hate Ricky and hope that I find someone else. Now, I don’t mean to imply that Ricky and I are together forever. From time to time I ask him (for dramatic effect) “are we getting married??” to which he answers “I don’t know. Too soon to tell.” I agree. But sometimes when we’re out together and we see couples who are obviously on a first or early date, with the ensuing awkward conversation/interaction, I turn to Ricky and tell him that we can’t break up anytime soon. I don’t have the energy to be single right now. He assures me that we won't. So for the time being at least (and maybe longer – we have started making tentative plans for our future “just in case”) I’ll hold Ricky’s hand and plan a double date with a friend and her man.

How about you? How much do you think outside people or their wishes for you affect your relationship or lack of one?