Is it just me, or when people become "a couple" do they all start to tend to hang out with other couples? Are single people cumbersome to naturally paired groupings?
I know that when I'm dating, I typically think of other couples to invite to do things. It just seems weird to be on a date with one other person in the mix, and inviting someone who's single after I have invited another couple seems like adding an awkward wheel.
I choose to fight against that tendency, but wondered if others have had similar experiences and what are your thoughts?
3 comments:
Single persons challenge the norm (myth?) that we are supposed to be in a monogamous relationship. Or at least they challenge our security in being 'betrothed' (spoken for). Who doesn't like like the good feeling of having someone claim his importance in her life? I think single people make us question the reality our own security.
-Chris
Brian and I have been partners for nearly fifteen years now, and most of our closest friends have been single. We do a lot with single people, and honestly, when we go out with one other person, it seems like an intimate (platonic intimate - not sexual intimate) triad, whereas when we do something with another couple, it tends to break off into two separate dyads.
My best friend since high school just got married after a very short engagement, and now that she actually has a husband, we see less of her. And things aren't quite the same now that she's partnered as well. So in that case, it was easier when she was single, because now that her husband is around, we are navigating the addition of another person to our "family." It's still wonderful, but being the new addition, he just doesn't have the same degree of intimacy that we all share because of the time we've all known each other.
But I do think that new couples tend to be self absorbed, or everything revolves around the relationship or family, or children, so when a single person gets invited to dinner or a movie with a couple who has lost their sense of individuality, well, they might was well be speaking another language. "Couple-speak" or "parentish" or something like that.
I have never felt awkward having a single friend come along with trav and i (or whomever else i was in relationships with). Nor have i felt wierd hanging out with my couple friends by myself. I think a lot of that social awkwardness comes from social expectations and the emphasis placed on people in "romantic" relationships and those not in them. Ideally, we all should feel welcome not matter what social situation we are placed in...though i am aware that's not how it works. :-)
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