This week is National Singles’ Week, created in Ohio in 1984 to celebrate the growing singles population.

Nearly 43 percent of people 15 and older are single, and two out of three people have never married. Over 12 million American workers are single parents.

Still, I’m not quite sure that singlehood is acceptable. While people are staying single longer and marrying later, the perception of “single” has changed little over the last 50 years. In our society, women are supposed to date nice boys — perhaps only one — get married and continue the human race. We may not use the terms “spinster” and “old maid” anymore, but the stigma is the same. The only difference is now we’re more tactful, asking, “Are you seeing anyone special?” or more directly, “Why haven’t you married?”

I know what you’re going to say: “What about ‘Sex and the City?’ That show was about being 30-something, single and fabulous.”

True, but for the most part in real life it is still taboo. Married women watched, partially horrified and partially curious.

There’s a difference between watching a single woman on television and being a single woman. The single woman may be liberated on television and in films, but she is still frowned upon and seen as defective in real life.

A newly single gal myself, I’ve spent a great deal of time thinking about being single, and more specifically, making the transition between unavailable to available. Making the dreaded transition is difficult, and rightly so.

Overnight you go from having someone you can depend on no matter what to someone who doesn’t return your phone calls and threatens to call the police if you don’t stop standing outside his window.

Suddenly you wear makeup again, shave your legs and dust off the perfume bottle. You suffer through those conversations that begin with “I know someone … ” from the friend who tries to help. But you know the guy she sets you up with will have nose hair and a creepy collection of “Lord of the Rings” action figures.

Your cell phone doesn’t ring nearly as often and when it does it’s your mother. You have to retire that special ring tone that sounds like it’s straight out of a 1970s porno.

You find yourself watching nightly reruns of “Law and Order” because you suddenly have big gaps of time with nothing to do. The sex stops. You think about your ex having sex with someone else. And then you think about how much work it will be to build a relationship again.

Right after the breakup, I sat thinking about all these reasons I hate being single, and I couldn’t move. I was paralyzed with fright. I had become accustomed to a relationship and I found it impossible to imagine myself without one.

However as time went on, I began to remember all of the advantages to singlehood.

The first is more free time (I know I put this in the “being single sucks” section, but just hear me out). I have more time for forgotten hobbies, friends and all my television shows.

I can bitch about men and relationships with all my single friends without feeling guilty or fraudulent. I can go out on real dates again. I don’t go over my cell phone minutes anymore.

I’ve been able to brush up on my flirting techniques. I can silently laugh at my attached friends’ relationship follies. I can have one-night stands. I can pick up whatever guy I want.

There is less drama in my life, period. No more crying, no more whining to my friends and no more arguing.

While writing this, I began to think about the word “single” itself. Single means alone, sole, solitary, unmarried. These words sound scary: no one wants to be alone. But just because you may be single, it doesn’t mean you have to be alone.

Someone once told me this little story: If you have a dandelion (a romantic partner), it may be pretty, but once it blows away, it’s gone. But if you have a rosebush (a big network of people who support you), when one rose dies, you still have more.

Putting all your energy into escaping singlehood might lead to a scattered dandelion. If you haven’t found that special someone, make maintaining your friendships your priority, not seeking out a romantic partner.

Take this week to take care of the rosebush, and if a dandelion grows, wonderful, but if not, at least you have the roses.

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