Happy Singles Awareness Day!

This was my greeting to a group of students around this time last year. I joked that this was an appropriate name, since many of us were being made painfully aware of our single status.

Nowhere is this phenomenon more true than in the “university belt” area of Manila. Street vendors will be selling thousands of flowers. Young women will be clinging to teddy bears and boxes of chocolates. Couples will walk hand in hand, celebrating their relationships. The actual landscape changes, dotted red by the multitudes holding some type of V-Day gift. Those of us with none to give or receive can feel a bit out of place.

The cynical side of me knows that at least half of these couples will not be together next year (maybe not even next month). I know teenagers, and I’m quite aware of their unstable emotions.

Any envy I feel is thus tempered by the cold hard facts. I know the damage and hurt that is done for the sake of “love.” I frequently listen to LifeGuide, a counseling show on UTv. It seems that most of the calls are love stories gone awry: A young woman complains that the father of her child is a womanizer. A young man discovers that his father has another family. I don’t just hear these stories on TV–I hear them in person from students in need of counseling. None of these people planned to create these scenarios. They once thought were in love, just like these young couples I see around me.

I have much more than cynicism and pessimism to get me through this season. After all, one of my dreams has come true this month–I’m an author! I’m not sure this reality has fully hit me. Even though I’ve seen and touched the book, it still seems too good to be true.

I also have hope for my own lovelife. It is a stubborn hope. I do believe that one day I’ll meet the right woman for me. I may never understand why it has taken so long, but I believe she’ll be worth the wait.

In the meantime, Mr Mapili (picky) here will keep searching and never settle for second best.

By the way: if any of you are in a relationship and are thinking of doing something stupid this Valentine’s Day (you know what I mean), please read The Valentine’s Day Massacre.