Sadie, Sadie Single Lady

A response to Sadie the Married Lady:

I'm thirty-one and have never been married. I have a string of failed relationships behind me. Living in Oklahoma doesn't help any, because everyone my age seems to be suckling the hard cock of tradition.

But I've got a split identity that cleaves me into two different personalities.

One personality reacts to the harsh judgments of many local married women. With phrases like, "People like you..." "I'm glad I'm not single," "you must be lonely," and "at least I'm married," I've felt like the brunt of criticism...as if something's wrong with me because I'm thirty-one and not married...unlike (apparently) every thirty-one year old woman in Oklahoma. These kinds of remarks make me feel bad about myself, and I don't like that because I'm a good person.

Despite the above-average success I've had in my life, I still feel like in my family's home community I'm not successful until I'm married. Why? Any idiot can marry any other idiot. And they do.

My other identity sleeps in until 8 am on Saturday and gets up to go for a 4-8 mile run. I go to the farmer's market and come home to work on one of my gardens. I grow my own flowers and vegetables, and eat relatively healthy, except for chocolate mousse and champagne at intervals. I paint on canvas or wood, or do some other creative projects. At nights I go out, or stay in and make elaborate dinners for my close friends. Or I stay in and read. Read in bed or the bathtub with candles and scented oils. Often on weekends, I have an overnight guest, male or female, or sometimes I prefer to sleep alone in the middle of my bed. The cherry on my experience is the luxury of leisure. This identity is happy and content, and pours my heart out to the world around me, as it lets the world pour it's exhilaration for living into me.

What I appreciate is a single or married woman who can love and appreciate me for who I am...single or married. I appreciate my women friends, married or single, who still maintain their own identity and personal strength. And who know that with or without a man, we've all got each other common.

What I don't appreciate is those married women who perpetuate the stereotype that being single is the sad alternative. I've been in your houses, I've seen your husbands, and the undesirable things that make me want to close my ears and eyes to this chaos of yours that I'm not accustomed to. The truth is, if you criticize me, 1.) you appear to be concealing insecurity and latent discontentment, and 2). you open the door for me to criticize your lifestyle choice.

I have two college degrees, have served on boards and traveled to most major cities in the US to do so. I have visited 14+ countries, have done commercial and runway modeling and still get stopped in the street by curious men. At 3 am on a school night when a girl or boyfriend calls sobbing, I put on my shoes and coat, and drive until I find them to give comfort. I'll do anything for my friends. And if a friend says, "Can you meet me in Wandsworth Town next Thursday?" I can and will. I have many friends, close loving friends, many interests and activities and access to leisure time. I can drive an hour just to tuck my Grandma into bed if I'd like...even at 2 am after getting off the phone with her (though she's so independent, she protests that she can tuck herself in).

My life only has the routine that I create for it. And if I don't like that routine, if I don't like that town or those people, I can move on. Every day can be what I make it, and living the way I chose is lovely. And by the way, I'd take a bullet for your children as long as you raise them with confidence and a self-possession like your own.

Other than that, I'm sure that you know as well as I do that your husband wants to do things to me that you'd cringe to imagine.

So leave me alone with the happy, loopy, childlike freedom of the unmarried life. Love me, and I'll worship you. Ask any of my women friends.