Quirkyalone

Sometimes authors talk about their books as babies. With no disrespect to the mothers of human beings, it’s true that when you publish a book, it feels like giving birth. You can’t just forget your new child either once it’s out. You take care of it over the years, pushing it out into the world, loving and caring for it so that it can have a life of its own. For me, quirkyalone is a conceptual baby because it’s had so many incarnations: book, website, holiday, workshop (summer camp for adults).

I have tended to quirkyalone now, amazingly, for ten years. It’s been ten years since I first uttered “quirkyalone” to friends, and nine years since I first pushed it out to the world in an essay in To-Do List magazine. (Five years since the book was published and this website launched.)

The fact that ten years have passed and I’m still so compelled (as well as at times, totally bored with and over) quirkyalone fascinates me. Usually a concept doesn’t have that kind of staying power. To try to understand why, and in time for the redesign of quirkyalone.net, I’m working on an essay considering quirkyalone ten years later. Think of it in the vein of the 7up series. I want to write about how the concept has and hasn’t changed for me personally along the planes of being twentysomething vs. a thirtysomething, and about how the concept resonates now in a world where there are so many more pop culture validations of singlehood (even Beyonce now feels the urge to take on a single alter ego) and demographically, households headed by married couples are now a minority.

The piece will also describe the impact quirkyalone has had on readers. I’m also curious about how quirkyalone has affected your life. How has it changed your sense of yourself? Has it helped you to meet people (whether friends or lovers)? Or to communicate with a partner better about your needs? People who have met on the forums have even traveled the world to meet each other. Please post your story about how quirkyalone has affected your life, or how your concept of quirkyalone has changed over time, in the comments for this post. If you prefer, you can email them to me at info AT quirkyalone.net.

I look forward to publishing the piece on this site and probably elsewhere too. Viva quirkyalone!

Related posts:

1. Want to Write for Quirkyalone?
2. Email of the Week: Essay from a Fellow QA
3. International Quirkyalone Day RoundUp