“All the Single Ladies” readalong: Chapters four and five

The next two chapters in our readalong of  “All the Single Ladies: Unmarried Women and the Rise of an Independent Nation” by Rebecca Traister explore unique aspects of single life – the craving for support and the challenges of solitude.

Chapter four is devoted to friendships that today are “recreating contemporary versions of very old webs of support.”

Friends have “pushed each into, and supported each other within, intellectual and public realms to which men rarely extended invitations.” Pairs of women founded colleges and settlement houses and headed suffrage, temperance and abolition movements.  

“It’s our friends who move us into new homes, friends with whom we buy and care for pets, friends with whom we mourn death and experience illness, friends alongside whom some of us may raise children and see them into adulthood.”

But single women also have to do everything for themselves, and that solitude brings several challenges. The upside is that single women are more likely to be active and find that “solitude – both the act of being alone and the attitude of being independent – a surprisingly sweet relief.”

But single women are often seen as selfish or as freaks – “like merchandise (that sits) on the shelf … unpurchased and unloved.” They face loneliness “by the drain of having to be everything for yourself.” They can be helpless in emergencies or illnesses although, Traister noted, married people face those same obstacles.  

How do you cope with emergencies or illnesses as a single woman? How do your friends play a factor in your lives?