Let me start this post by making sure to set this very clearly. I love my married friends. I love their children. I am completely jazzed that I have them in my life and I’d take a bullet for them. Also let me state: I feel as though I am a woman relatively at ease being single. I was never one to fantasize about my wedding or a family life. I always thought I wanted kids but them being biologically mine is a yearning I haven’t really felt.

So why when I look at the smiling faces of Christmas cards to they sometimes make me feel like I’ve been punched in the gut? These are some of the dearest people in my life. Then I sit with my feelings for awhile and try and dissect it. Is it jealousy? How can it be jealousy for a thing I’ve never wanted? Can society’s pull for this idealized femininity be at fault? I don’t think that can totally it. I’ve always made a very conscious decision to not follow society’s norms. I’m Auntie Mame! I’m Gertrude Stein! I’m Bette Davis!

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Then I think about each of them and realize that all the heroines of my life led extraordinary lives. And two out of three mentioned above were handed a bunch of money. Think about it. Would Auntie Mame be nearly as entertaining if the book/movie/musical ended after the stock market crash? It’s just her crying on the one piece of furniture she still owns and the screen goes black instead? Instead we get her ascending the staircase to plan her fabulous trip to India. Gertrude Stein could really only afford to be Gertrude Stein because she came from money. Because, let’s face it, Picasso paying her in paintings is a long term win but it did not keep her and Alice in chic lesbian sweaters. I know what you’re thinking, “But Bette Davis didn’t have a lot of money, that’s why she had to do all that television!” But she was known to be the most extraordinary actress of her time.

To fulfill a dream, to be allowed to sweat over lovely labor, to be given the chance to create, is the meat and potatoes of life. The money is the gravy. I will not retire while I’ve still got my legs and my makeup box.

Bette Davis

All this is to say, up until now in my mind, if a woman wants to remain unmarried and unattached, she must live an extraordinary life to ensure that she earns her keep in the universe. Whether that be talent, money, or a convenient combination of both you better have a good reason not to be married with 2 children and a husband. And that’s total bullshit. If you’re a single woman who gets through the day being kind and keeping a roof over her head, that should qualify as an extraordinary life. That is enough. That being said, I’ll keep trying to strive to be the best creative I can be (shameless plug, have you checked out my podcast and Patreon?) but I think it’s time that I stop comparing myself to fictitious characters or Hollywood legends.

That being said if a Forrest Tucker-esque man wants to marry me and fall off a mountain a year into our marriage leaving me extraordinarily wealthy, I won’t complain.