One or two?

The endless argument about which is the best lifestyle, living alone or living with someone else, polarises a lot of people. Some reel off all the benefits of being on your own while others say no, no, it's much better to cohabit.

Having spent long periods both on my own and living with someone else, I see the perks and drawbacks of both. But the abstract argument about which is best misses the point, because in reality it's a question of what suits your particular personality. Gregarious types like company, retiring types want solitude.

Personally I much prefer living with someone else. I like the company, the emotional support, the private jokes, the shared experiences, the joint decision-making, the reliance on the other's expertise, the hugs and cuddles. And the bed's a lot warmer!

When I lived alone (for about eight years), I liked the independence, the simplicity of only considering myself, the ability to freely indulge my own tastes, the lack of distractions.

That doesn't amount to much though compared to cohabiting. Being on my own may have been great in some ways, but I was aware there was so much missing. Especially the emotional support, shared experiences and hugs and cuddles.

Living alone is probably okay if you have a big social network - plenty of friends and family to give you the benefits of company - or if you spend a lot of time travelling and you're not at home very much, but if you only have one or two friends, as I had, and you're always inside the same four walls, then it's not such fun.

But I know people living on their own who are perfectly happy and would hate to share their space with anyone else.

Whatever floats your boat....

Generation game

I so take for granted my childless status that I've never thought very much about the ways in which my life differs from that of the average parent. It's only occasionally that something said by a harassed mum or bemused dad gives me an insight. For example:

1) I can never be hopelessly embarrassed by my child. I needn't worry about the grunting, shaggy-haired, sloppily-dressed, drunken young lad staggering along the pavement. He's not mine.

2) My child can never be hopelessly embarrassed by me. I can lurch around the house playing air guitar, spouting street slang or wearing bright pink pyjamas without being told to act my age and stop trying to be a teenager.

3) I don't have to keep coughing up money because my child needs tuition fees, a flat deposit, a car, tickets for Lady Gaga, new clothes for an interview or a flight home from Australia.

4) I don't have to worry that my over-suggestible offspring will end up a druggie, an anorexic, an alcoholic, a prostitute, a banker or a confidence trickster.

5) My offspring never has to worry that I'll squander the inheritance, go senile, become bedbound, fill the house with cats, take in a deranged lodger or fill the fridge with rotting food.

6) My child doesn't have to waste precious hanging-out time showing me how to fix the computer/ the iPad/ the mobile/ the lost emails. Or explaining the latest fad for corsets/ super-bling/ silly bandz/ half baldies/ vampires.

7) I don't have to provide ongoing emotional support over my child's traumatic break-up with the love of his/her life and daily threats of suicide.

8) My child doesn't have to provide ongoing emotional support as daddy and mummy go through a bitter and messy divorce with each one blaming the other for causing it.

Of course, in return for these advantages some may think I've missed out on the most wonderful and rewarding experience of my life - having children. Well, what you've never had, you never miss, as they say. And I've never had the teeniest parental urge.

I'm not entirely free of such domestic headaches though. Jenny and I are quite wayward enough to cause each other hopeless embarrassment. Or frantic worries. Or bug-eyed disbelief. But at least I don't have to fly her home from Down Under.