Wedding Bell Blues and the Limbo Life

The problem with weddings is that they remind me of how chronically single I am. I don't much care for casual dating (and my go at it last August definitely didn't make me want change my mind) and I've found that while I like going to bars and can't imagine dating a guy who didn't like them as well, I don't like the guys I meet there. I'm not saying I'm not happy for my friend. Her wedding was beautiful; her husband was charming and everything one could want. Actually it wasn't so much the wedding as being there with my parents, my sister and her boyfriend. I felt like a fifth wheel, especially as the only other people I knew were the bride's family. We knew each other growing up, but our families moved so we didn't go to high school together. It also makes me feel more and more like I'm doomed to be an old maid as I go to weddings of friends who are younger than me. I'm just glad that my younger sister isn't ready for that yet. Not that it really matters as she and her boyfriend have been together forever. And so I'm stuck wondering what I'm doing wrong that I seem to be the only one who isn't coupling off as if ordained by some godlike force. It's not like I'm against marriage. But where is one supposed to meet anyone worth dating? And it's hard to even contemplate dealing with that when I don't even know where or how I'm going to be living at the end of the summer. Part of me thinks perhaps leaving Dallas is the right thing to do. But then I remember how long it took me to find friends and how much I love the friends I have here. I've never had a hometown. And I hated having to leave my friends behind when I moved from Kansas to Iowa between 7th and 8th grade. If I could take them all with me, then I would move anywhere. But that's not possible. And it makes me wish even more that I had a husband. Because then it doesn't matter where you move as long as you move together. You always know at least one person, no matter where you go. Although my friend who got married last week is going to spend the next six months on her own while her husband finishes his army training, which just goes to show that life is never easy for anyone. We all have challenges that we must face. And we have to be strong enough to face them even if it's on our own. Which sounds so trite and stupid. Just like everybody keeps telling me "Everything happens for a reason." And that when it's the right job and what I'm meant to be doing, it'll all work out. But with more rejection piling up on me each week, and emails informing me that more qualified candidates were chosen for jobs that I was amply qualified for, I despair of anything working itself out. Because I'm not doing anything wrong. I'm simply competing with people who I should never have to compete with in a normal economy for near-entry-level jobs that I shouldn't have any problems getting. I'd feel bad for the new college grads if my life didn't suck so much that I can't spare any pity for anyone else. At least none of them have been unemployed for 9 months. I don't know what I'm supposed to do until I manage to get into grad school (even if I apply this fall and by some miracle get accepted, I still have to find a way to live for the next 16 months or so and there's no way I can work as a retail slut for that long; I'll lose my mind). I'm living in limbo and I'm not talking a fun game to play at parties. I can't get a job; I can't get a guy; and I can't make any plans with anyone. I had to miss my favorite cousin's graduation this weekend to boot. It is the icing on top of a cake of life sucks. Black licorice-flavored icing on a cake in which the sugar was replaced with salt, the outer ring is dry and the inside isn't baked all the way through.