Matty Litwack: I don't date because I love being alone

By Matty Litwack

Washington Post·

8 Jul, 2015 07:30 PM5 mins to read

Staying single eases a lot of pressure that couple's face. Photo / Thinkstock

Opinion

I'm a comedian, and I hate dating.

I used to blame my dating difficulties on comedy itself - I told myself I couldn't date because of my busy schedule. The truth is I'm not all that busy. I actually spend a lot of time just drinking seltzer water and staring out of windows.

Rather, I don't date because I don't want to. Being alone is fantastic. Here are a few reasons why:

My emotions are safe and protected.

Because I never date, I never get rejected. This is super-convenient, because rejection feels terrible. Some people think that dating is worth the risk of rejection - those same people will try to tell you that it's important to do your best no matter what. These people will tell you that "you miss 100 per cent of the shots you don't take." It's important to ignore those people. It's also important to remember that when Wayne Gretzky stated that line about missing shots, he was talking about hockey, not dating. These are two totally different concepts. Hockey goals can't hurt your feelings when you miss. In dating, it's more like "you miss 100 per cent of the rejections if you stay indoors."

I don't have to make geography-related decisions.

Dating often involves finding a location for the date. This is my least favorite part of dating, because I'm an incredibly indecisive person. In general, I try to avoid the massive amounts of time it takes to make the decisions. When it comes to picking date locations, I'm especially confused. I don't know where to go because I don't go to a lot places, period. I spend most of my time at home. The only other places I visit are comedy venues and convenience stores. If I wanted to go to other places, I would. Sure I could take a date to a comedy show - that's a fun idea - but what if it goes well? Where do I go for the second date? Another comedy show? After seven or eight dates like this, she'll realise I have no other ideas.

My food is exactly where I left it.

One of the cool parts of being single is that I get to eat all of the food I purchase. For example, I eat two bananas every day. I buy these bananas six at a time every three days. I buy bananas in groups of two based on the ripeness level I prefer and the ripeness level I anticipate the bananas will be at in the near future. If it's Sunday, I buy bananas for Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. I can maintain a banana cycle continuously for years at a time if I'm single. Now, let's say I start dating a girl and she eats one of those bananas. Now I have to figure out if that was a Tuesday or a Wednesday banana. Now my entire system is out of whack, and I have to make a special trip to the store to buy a replacement banana. The stress isn't worth the trouble. It's easier to just not date.

I can sleep a lot.

Another upside of being single is that I can get as much sleep as I want. I don't need to coordinate my sleep schedules with another person. I could go to sleep right now if I wanted to. In fact, I'm closing my eyes as I write this and nobody can stop me. Do you think I could take a nap if I were on a date right now? No way. You can't take a nap on a date even if you're married. At night time, loneliness is even more convenient. I don't have to stay up late making out or whatever couples do - I can just go straight to sleep. In the morning, I'm free to exercise my normal wake-up routine - in which I lie in bed and quietly stare at the ceiling for two hours until I feel okay.

I'm allowed to be sadder than couples.

Society is more accepting of depressed single people. Whenever I'm sad and single, my friends think: "Oh, he's just sad because he's lonely," when in reality, I was planning on being sad anyway. My sadness stems from a deep-seated fear of death, so it doesn't matter if I'm in a relationship or not. However, being single gives me a convenient excuse to mope around. If I were in a relationship and sad, my friends might say, "Hey, why are you so bummed out when things are going well?," and I could no longer use loneliness as an excuse.

I would have to answer honestly and tell them:

"Actually, things aren't going well. We're all living a fleeting existence on a giant rock that is overheating in the sun. All of our hopes, dreams and ideas will eventually die out. Even the sun itself will someday run out of energy. Everything that I've ever thought was important is unimportant on the grand scale. Everything that I have achieved or have yet to achieve will mean nothing once I am gone."

And then my friends would probably reply: "Alrighty, then. We're not sure what to tell you, buddy."