Single on Tisha B’Av

Hello, everyone. I hope you’re all doing well and drinking lots of water, especially before the fast.

 

Last week I wrote about boundaries and people-pleasing, and I plan to post some more expanding on that topic later this week or next. So check back for that.

 

This week I wrote a paper for one of my classes and because we could choose any topic within loose parameters, I chose singlehood (obviously). I love writing about singlehood 😉 . I’ve given it so much thought over the years and explored it from so many angles that writing the paper was kind of a pleasure. However, one journal article I read for background research was somewhat difficult for me to get through because it hit so close to home. The article was called “The ambiguous loss of singlehood: Conceptualizing and treating singlehood ambiguous loss among never-married adults” (Jackson, 2018). (Never married as opposed to divorced or widowed). Ambiguous loss is a loss that is not clearly defined; in this case, the person who is missing is “psychologically present but physically absent.” Grieving the loss and moving on would mean giving up on ever achieving the relationship. It’s either that or a kind of continuous grieving.

 

The article was very interesting and affirming to me because I know at times I do feel grief over being single (as opposed to the frustration or fear or sadness or anger I feel at times, too). Grief is a powerful and beautiful emotion. As the British physician Dr. Colin Murray Parkes once wrote, “Grief is the price we pay for love.” Experiencing grief over being single means I feel a bond with someone I haven’t met yet but with whom I am waiting to meet and to devote myself.

 

I thought it was very apropos to be reading this article on Erev Tisha B’Av. Part of what makes the ambiguous loss of singlehood so hard is the lack of rituals to demarcate and recognize the loss. How does one memorialize something that hasn’t happened — but could, any day? When do we designate a time to grieve a gaping hole we still wait to be filled?

 

We do it every year on Tisha B’Av. Galus is an ambiguous loss. We lost something that we’re always in the process of getting back, always expecting to appear right around the corner. And even though it may take long…How can we be at another Tisha B’Av? How can we be at another?

 

Galus is singlehood — Hashem is alone, and His children are alone. And singlehood is galus — a metaphor for our national galus, and a personal manifestation of our national galus, multiplied by thousands.

 

Tisha B’Av is a day to grieve all our losses, the finite and the ongoing, which are all a part of this long and painful exile. It is a deeply painful and sad day, but ultimately it is good and it will be transformed into something joyous. And be”H the same will happen for all of our ambiguous losses that we memorialize on this day.