Being single is something that I think about often…more often than not actually. I was thinking about it just tonight, I mean really thinking. Sometimes I feel like a woman with some unknown disease which baffles the experts. I’ve read books; I’ve listened to talks-sermons-lectures; I’ve tried every home remedy—from a suggestion to “wear your hair down and go to more church b-b-q’s” to making that one special recipe; I’ve followed prescriptions and have bought subscriptions to eHarmony etc.; I’ve “put myself out there;” I’ve been quiet and reserved; and I’ve listened politely to all the hypotheses of friends and relatives regarding my “condition.” I took a little inventory of all the things people say and suggest and while ten years ago many of those things gave me hope onto which to cling, gave me something to work on/toward, gave me something to pray about, now they hold water like a sieve.

As I drove home tonight, windows and moon roof open, music blasting—some haunting and captivating melody saturating my soul—I wonder, “Is all that I hope and long for really even out there?” My optimism wanes. I long to persevere in my hoping but some days I feel it is a faint mirage. My pool of single girl-friends is evaporating. Those who remain are situated on various points of the hope spectrum. Some women remain quite hopeful that their dreams of love and romance will be abundantly fulfilled. Yet some women, like a ship tossing cargo overboard to lighten the load, cross things off their list convinced that they have become just too picky and must become more “realistic” about what they are looking for. And so I watch as friends unload beloved passions and hobbies in order to travel more lightly, to be more compatible with whoever may come along, and they advise me to do the same telling me there are just some things you have to sacrifice for a relationship. And some days I feel like I’m sentencing myself to spinsterhood if I refuse to give up things that I hope for–like someone who loves dancing!

But let me go back to some of the sayings and things I’ve heard over the years and, if you will, allow me to indulge in a bit of reflection:

1. “It will happen just when you stop looking/wishing/waiting for it.”

Well then crap! Because it just so happens that I don’t think I will EVER stop looking, wishing or waiting for the love of my life—the prodigal son’s father ain’t got nothin’ on me in porch pacing!

2. “Maybe you’re just not ready, dear. Maybe this is God’s way of preparing you.”

I took this to heart for many years and worked my butt off getting ready trying to make myself into the kind of woman who would be desirable and healthy and lovely—I was in hot pursuit of being a Proverbs 31 kind of woman But these days, this kind of response just makes me angry—“I HAVE been preparing, praying, working, reading, sacrificing, and WAITING!” What about all the people who never had to wait this long? All those who married young—Does that mean they were all good to go at a younger age and I’m just such a mess its taken me this long to get it together? I can’t really swallow that.

3. “Maybe he’s not ready, maybe God is still working on him.”

Hey I like the rugged unfinished look—works for furniture, why not a guy? Okay but seriously…when I hear this I think about all the long years I have prayed for my future spouse and have thought about him and have made choices in his/our best interest and I think, “Not ready?! You’ve got to be kidding me? What is he doing?” If this is the case, maybe God could give him a kick in the pants so he’ll realize he’s kept me waiting way beyond fashionably late!”

4. “God won’t give you a boyfriend until you are totally content with being single.”

Well then that stinks for me because I was not made to be single and don’t think I will ever be fully content with being single. Just like I was made to dwell in the Kingdom of God so my life anywhere other than that will consist of a constant and underlying restlessness and discontent.

5. “You have to be to be content with Jesus as your only lover before you will ever be given a relationship.”

This one I have never been able to understand. My relationship with Christ is deep and intimate and I am committed 100%; I will live and die for him and there is nothing I haven’t and wouldn’t sacrifice for him. And I have been blessed by his lavish and abundant love. But its kind of like a long distance relationship in that sometimes you just need the tangible manifestation of that love—a real flesh and blood human being to hold, to look at, to touch, on whom to bestow your love.

This is all God’s idea anyway—God and Adam had a good thing going there in the Garden of Eden: hanging out, naming stuff, exploring places, walking and talking together. But God saw that Adam needed one like himself to whom he could relate and with whom he could commune—its all there in Genesis 2:18-25.

This isn’t even including all those sermons where they talk to the married couples about loving one another and serving one another etc and then turn to the singles and talk about how they need to just be in love with Jesus. As one friend pointed out—we are ALL supposed to have intimate relationship with Christ, not just singles! So does it seem like married people get off the hook of pursuing a head-over-heels kind of love for Christ?

6. “You should enjoy this time of dating and being single and having all your freedom because you’ll totally miss all of it once you’re married.”

Sure I’ll miss spontaneous outings, eating straight out of the ice cream carton, and having the whole bed to myself. But I won’t miss the endless wondering, the inevitable misunderstanding of signals and the perpetual lack of a “plus one” on RSVPs. I’m thankful for the time that I have had to adventure, explore, become more myself than ever—it has indeed been a rich time. But I am so ready to share all of that with a person, not just with my journal!

In the end I know they mean well. But the reality is that for many of us who are older and still single, it is a chronic pain in our soul that we live with day in and day out, and I just think that—as with other circumstances—quick fix-it band-aids just won’t stop the hemorrhaging. Most people are just as confounded by my situation as I am. But in the end, the only explanation that matters is God’s and well, let’s just be honest, he hasn’t been that forthcoming with explicit answers on the issue.

In all the sayings and scriptures that I’ve heard quoted, this one—paradoxically—brings me the most comfort: “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.” –Proverbs 13:12. I like verses like this, they keep it real. It allows me to hold God accountable to the promises He weaves throughout his Word and empowers me to, “approach the throne of grace with confidence…”

I do still dream about that tree of life. I picture myself perched on one of its branches reading poetry or lounging under its lush green canopy of shade or building a fort around its trunk with my children or flying gleefully on a swing hung from a bough or carving the initials of my beloved’s and my names or using its fallen limbs to fuel a fire in winter or looking to its twigs for buds in spring or beholding it’s foliage ablaze in autumn.

Resiliently, hope remains intact.