The assumption that we grow up only if we follow the culturally prescribed life path and get married in our 20s is pervasive. Bella DePaulo addresses this assumption as Myth #4 in her book “Singled Out.” Karen Gail Lewis also touches on it when she proposes a new lifestyle model in her book “With or Without a Man.” The current model suggests that adulthood is reached when we get married. What happens if we never marry? Well, we never really become adults. The myth is also perpetuated by the idea that we grow the most when we are with another person. Being single is just so much easier than being in a relationship.

DePaulo eloquently debunks the myth by pointing out, among other things, how the current nuclear family structure has evolved into a sort of care insurance. If we’re married, we feel secure to expect that our partner will care for us if we were to get sick. It is a very unreliable insurance, of course (the divorce rate in couples affected by chronic illness is 75%), but the idea nevertheless undermines the larger community. Family comes first. If any time and money is left over, then, maybe friends can expect some help, and then the neighbors, though they probably come up short. As DePaulo puts it: “we have taken a small set of relationships that deserve to be treasured, and turned them into the only relationships worth valuing at all.” (Singled Out, p. 133). Instead she calls for valuing “our common humanity.”

Singles, on the other hand, if they want to be happy, have to rebuild the community (as Kay Trimberger points out in “The New Single Woman”). They are mature enough to realize that without a community, without many friends, they might be in trouble if they were to get sick.

So, who is more mature? A married person who assumes that her/his partner is going to take care of them (when many call for a divorce at the sign of a protracted illness) or the single person who surrounds herself/himself with many friends? Maybe it’s my bias but I think community building is more mature than (naive) reliance on one person…