Welcome to strangers.

From KCW and Radiotopia.

I'm Leah Tao.

And this is the third installment in our Summer of Love series.

And it is about love.

It's very much about love.

But perhaps not in the way you'd expect. Today's story is about

the kind of love you might seek when romantic love has let you down, or proven elusive,

or just been something you were never all that into, because there's really no way to do a

summer of love series without talking about the singles experience, is there?

Well, for me there isn't, and the fact is that 87 million Americans are single.

That's roughly 45% of all Americans over the age of 18,

according to the Pew Research Center.

But being single does not mean being alone.

It's becoming a family way of life.

A full 30% of kids in America live with a parent who identifies as single, also according to Pew.

And many of those kids had two parents involved at some point,

at least at the point of conception.

But more and more women are choosing to go it entirely alone

and just have a baby on their own.

We couldn't find any real stats on the number of women doing this,

but in my little world, it sure seems to be a trend.

...