Constable: Finding love not like job hunt
June used to be the month for weddings, but recent surveys find that more and more people are postponing their marriage ceremony until September. Or October. Or never.
When it comes to tying the knot, the tide turned in 2014, when the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics showed for the first time that the majority of Americans 16 and older were single. Illinois is home to more single adults than married adults. There are as many explanations for that singleness as there are single people.
“As a kid, I got scared about the whole marriage thing because I saw so many people get divorced,” remembers Steven Provenzano, a 58-year-old Streamwood entrepreneur who serves as president of Executive Career Services & DTP and makes his living as a career coach and through books about résumés and making connections in the business world. “I was single by choice.”
Provenzano built his career, bought a house, traveled to 31 countries and dated. He also wrote down his observations about his relationships during the decades. A few years ago, when he finally became interested in meeting a single woman and getting married, he thought about the best way to do that.
“Why don't I put it together in some kind of book that helps people?” Provenzano remembers thinking.
He acknowledges that some people might scoff at the idea of taking relationship advice from a man who has never married, but Provenzano says he has had serious relationships and vacationed with girlfriends but wasn't ready for a marriage commitment. The single man sees his new book, “DATE! Is a Four-Letter Word: and Why You Should Never Use it” (dateisafourletterword.com), as a way to teach single people how to make connections with other single people.
“Loneliness is big business,” Provenzano notes. Online dating, which is a $2 billion industry in the United States, is the way a third of married couples meet in today's world. But that method doesn't work for some.
“Everybody's home alone with their cellphones and computers. A lot of people work by themselves so it's hard to meet people at work,” Provenzano says. “Get away from your computer and cellphone and get out there and meet people. I think people should try to talk to as many people as they can.”
The problem is that lots of people don't know how to talk face to face, Provenzano says. What works for his business clients searching for a good employer doesn't work for people hoping to make love connections.
“They over-analyze things, and they are trying to map it out like some kind of job or project,” Provenzano says. “It's about emotion and chemistry. It's not about logistics. Logic kind of wrecks romance. Love is not logical.”
Instead of being desperate to sell yourself and convince another person to buy into that, people should focus instead on, “How can I be a positive force in someone's life?” Provenzano says. “Keep an open mind, clear yourself of your past, be cordial and nice.”
Provenzano's book contains advice and observations from eclectic sources such as Roger Daltrey, Shakespeare, Steve Jobs, Kahlil Gibran, Winston Churchill, The Talking Heads, Oscar Wilde, Sting, Poi Dog Pondering, Irina Dunn, Eric Clapton and Yogi Berra.
“We are influenced by a lot of things — by music, by movies, by TV,” Provenzano says. “A lot of messages tell us not to get married when we're growing up and to stay single and be cool and independent and all that. That affects people.”
Having never married shouldn't be seen as a liability, Provenzano says, adding, “I avoided the horrible divorce. That's a good thing.”
One piece of advice comes from his parents, who were married for 71 years until his dad's death in 2017. “It's simple. Put the other person ahead of you and cooperate,” his mom told him. “Love each other, in front of your children; make sure they see you do that all the time.”