The single life

To misquote the great bluegrass singer Ricky Skaggs, the single life is the life I lead. And has been for nearly three years. At my age - in my fifth decade - it is something I think about a lot. It is not a pose I have chosen. But here we are.

One thing you notice is that most of your friends are paired up. One wants the best for them of, of course, but it's difficult not to feel envy and, at times, resentment. It's so easy for A and B to be having dinner with X and Y. Pairs pair up so easily. Four, or six, are good numbers for an evening out. Throw in the complication of Z, however, and it's all that much more awkward.

There is a line, which I can't remember verbatim, from Len Deighton's wonderful Bernard Samson triple trilogy, in which Bernard, abandoned (as he thinks) by his wife, is a single man, and rues the idea, much bruited, that an "extra man" is such a useful thing for dinner parties, but finds that not to be true. He is right. You don't get invited to things to make up the numbers, you really don't. It's a fallacy, at least in my experience.

Maybe, as my best friend Pete tells me, its a factor of age. People retreat into themselves, have families and domestic priorities. Maybe that's true. But I think there's something else. It's as if the ageing singleton has some contagion which must be avoided. People don't want you looming over their happiness, as if you might taint it, somehow. You are a brooding presence, no matter how chipper and cheerful you try to come across.

Yet I can't be alone, surely. I'm 40. I don't socialise easily but with my friends I am, I hope, good company. Not naturally gregarious, but, in comfortable company, chatty and cheery. I'm not seeking partnership - I think I may be too damaged by experience for that now - but companionship, yes, I seek that out at every turn, whenever I can. Man is a social animal, as whoever-it-was said. (Aristotle, the internet tells me.) But the effort seems to fall always on the singleton. How often have I approached paired-up friends to see if they're free, only to be told, oh no, sorry, we're seeing <insert other pairing>? All too often.

Weddings are a nightmare, of course, though I'm at an age now when they're becoming rarer. (Maybe I'll have a wave of second marriages.) These days it's christenings (occasionally) or birthday parties. Whatever the event, though, turning up solo is, for someone shy like me, an absolutely nightmare. What if no-one will talk to me? Will I be left in a corner drinking tepid wine and watching other people have fun? I've been to functions like that.

This is not meant as a moan, or a cri de coeur, merely an observation, which might strike a chord with others in my situation. I can't be the only one. Maybe it's partly my own fault for being so insular, so diffident, so awkward. If I were a different person - outgoing, gregarious, self-confident - I would see opportunities rather than hurdles, perhaps. A room full of people I didn't yet know. But of course you need to be invited, and that's my beef, if I may put it in that crass way. As a middle-aged single man, you just fade out of view and out of people's minds.

My ex tells me I should try a dating website. It's kindly-meant advice, but I couldn't even face it. The idea of meeting a total stranger and establishing some spark with her is anathema to me. And, as I say, I am shop-soiled. I don't even know if I want to be part of a pair any more. There are times when I can, genuinely, relish my solitude, and the peace that comes with it, though many more when I curse it. Yearning for the past. For how things were. Turning the clock back.

Which, of course, you can never do. I must adjust to The New Reality. It would just be nice is someone asked me out for a drink. And on that maudlin, passive-aggressive note, I will end.