Sherlock Holmes. Jeff Lebowski. Uncle Buck. These men are my life coaches now.
My teenage children are figuring out who they want to be. Consciously or not, they are looking at adults and wondering, “Do I want to be like that?” I try to show them that the question is not “Who am I?” but “Who am I today?”
Doctor Who isn’t the only one capable of regeneration. Today, in my middle-aged, second-singledom, I want the “live-and-let-live” life of a bachelor-uncle.
Living Like a Dude
I started to #livelikeadude during the pandemic, in those heady, feral days when we suspended all the non-plague related social rules. (Didn’t we? It seems like we did.)
In early 2020, I was early into my sole-proprietorship, my husband and I were beginning to break up, my kids were in dining-room-table-school, my family and friends were navigating their own problems, and all the bars were closed.
They were epic new levels of self-reliance, which intensified once my husband moved out and we divided the stuff and the kid-time in half. At the beginning of his week, he would pick up the kids, and I would go to the grocery store for a 6-pack of Diet Coke and a rotisserie chicken. For the next seven days, I would happily eat alone, pulling meat off with my fingers at the sink.
Since it was COVID, I wasn’t just pseudo-single again, I had barely any social obligations, especially to people I didn’t enjoy. I was also suddenly freed from the logistics of joint-decision-making and the need to make everyone else happy (a burden both social and self-imposed, and which I quite obviously failed at anyway).
My bubble became filled exclusively with mutual-admiration societies. This was true on the work-front, too: I found myself seeking professional advice from savvy people (mostly men) who recognized my business value. They challenged me when I was low-balling myself and helped me focus. Since I had no domestic responsibilities during the weeks when my kids were at their dad’s, I had time to listen to their work stories and observe how they managed decisions. It turns out that men aren’t apologetic when telling someone the cost of their expertise and work, and I just quietly started to copy them. All in all, their coaching led to better designed services, better pricing and less anxiety. Win-win-win.
The Benign, Non-Interventionist Philosophy of the Bachelor Uncle
As the Dude taught us, a good rug holds the room together. In the division of assets, the living room rug went to my ex’s house, and I needed a new one. I went to Wayfair, I saw the rug I liked, I bought it.
That was it.
Could… could all decisions be made this way? Without even talking with someone else, without considering anyone else, without negotiations? Just… see it, like it and buy it?
And thus begun my bachelor uncle home life. It’s frictionless. At work and home, I stopped apologizing for my needs and preferences. There wasn’t anyone to apologize to, anyway. I just figured out what I wanted to do, and I did that. I always thought it was selfish to make decisions based on your own needs and preferences, but now its the only way to make decisions.
My bachelor-uncle philosophy is like a junk drawer—there’s enough in here that I can make anything work. Here are a few aspects of the canon:
- 3 sets of pushups = a pizza. Or one set. Whatever.
- Sleep like a starfish and snore like a dragon.
- See mid-week—mid-day!—baseball games.
- Have a dog.
- Nap whenever.
- Work as much as you want, whenever you want.
- A bachelor is not a priest. There is no vow of poverty.
- Let people’s problems be other people’s problems.
I love the simplicity of life without shared decision-making. Weekly menu planning. Picking restaurants. Vacations. Retirement plans. Art. Paint color. I spend no time talking about decisions, and therefore, I spend less time making decisions. Life moves faster.
I don’t mean to diminish marriage or glorify divorce and global pandemics. I just personally experienced a confluence of events that forced me to revisit my assumptions and reclaim some autonomy. And whether you are married, single, or in transition, a sense of autonomy is important.
Living autonomously as bachelor uncle is not selfish—in fact, it’s improving my social and personal relationships. Martyrdom can lead to resentment and poison relationships, but my bachelor-uncle persona provides an every-increasing sense of what it takes to:
- Make home feel good (a colorful rug, a clean garage, a pink closet with fairy lights)
- Parent teenagers (keep them alive, appreciate the time they give you, don’t interfere unless necessary, let them come to you, give advice with a light touch)
- Treasure relationships (warm and trustworthy people, new places and solo nights)
- Have a vibrant professional life (solve interesting problems, work as much as I want, provide unique value, don’t work with assholes, get market-rate, learn constantly)
- Know when to hold ‘em. Know when to fold ‘em. Know when to walk away. Know when to run.
I decide for me, and I let other people decide for themselves. (Hold my beer, I invented boundaries!)
Buck can keep his cigars: I’m not becoming his version a bachelor uncle—or anyone else’s, for that matter. I have amazing kids, energizing work, a therapist, a clean house, the perfect rug and the best of friends. Tonight, I’ll have a rotisserie chicken and a 6-pack of Diet Coke. I’m good.