Being single can make a person very idle. Even everyday tasks like lunch can seem laborious.

I've recently moved back to the familial home, and last Sunday, what should have been a leisurely lunch became a chore. Within minutes of sitting down to an ample roast dinner, my elder sister and her fiancé were excitedly boasting of their Caribbean honeymoon.

All of a sudden a blunt voice cut through the shrieks of delight; 'Were you hungry Mand? Did you have enough to eat?' my mother enquired incredulously. Upon which I looked up at her wild eyes as they bore into the sole broccoli stem that lay marooned on my plate, as the rest worked its way down my gullet. Absent-mindedly, I answered, 'Yeah, I'm just bored'. Bored of eating, and bored of honeymoon talk.

It was worse than losing my appetite. The previous pleasure of eating had deteriorated to a functional task, not so much unpleasant as arbitrary.

I toyed with the notion that love is not for everyone. Perhaps certain feelings, like certain types of food, react differently, unexpectedly. Some people are intolerant, but put up with the uncomfortable side-effects because they’re stuck on something, or someone. However some substances can provoke more volatile reactions, and thus have bigger ramifications for the user. Take for example, an allergy to alcohol - and I’m not talking about the usual hangover induced nausea.

In spite of an allergy to alcohol, the actor Richard E. Grant played one of the most memorable drug-addled characters ever to hit the screen as Withnail in ‘Withnail and I’.  In order to prepare for the role he had to get drop-dead drunk, and was violently sick as a result.  Maybe love is the same. Perhaps all we need is to ‘get drunk’ on love, if only the once, just to get some sense of what it’s about.  The stakes are high and the consequences immeasurable, yet in spite of it's nasty side-effects we spend much of our lives under love’s sway.

For the sadists among us there’s Valentine’s Day. Big business with the card and retail industries, you can’t even buy a scratch card without some reference to the ‘perfect’ love match: ‘Match the ideal pair to any of your pairs to win a prize’, as if love were a redeemable voucher. Lingerie companies are the biggest perpetrators, siphoning men’s desires through their wallets.

What happened to last year’s lingerie set, last year’s boyfriend? Maybe being with someone is not the be all and end all. I spent last Valentine’s with someone who turned out to be totally wrong for me. If, like me, you’re going solo this Valentine’s day, count your blessings that you’re not with someone who is making you unhappy. As the late, great Jeff Buckley said, ‘Love brings us to who we need’: we cannot know how or when.

By Amanda Carey/ MOLI