A Matter of Choice

This post has been festering inside of me for some time now. So, if I sound a tad disgruntled, it’s because I am.

It all started the night before I headed off to TLWTMS (back in February). As I sat in the kitchen, chatting with my mom after dinner about all of the things that I was looking forward to seeing and doing and telling her about how excited I was to have been awarded the scholarship that would make this experience possible, her only response was, “But don’t you think it’s time for you to settle down, get married, and have a family?”

Umm…no.

And during The Dig, one of my teammates repeatedly offered to set me up with a “nice Southern gentleman.” After I had already declined on three or four separate occasions and had explained that I was really not interested in getting married, he responded, “That just can’t be true, SW. And I’m so sure that I’m right that I’d bet all of the money in my bank account that you’re going to be married within the next three years.”

Umm…I don’t think so.

And just a few days ago, when chatting with one of my female professors (with whom I'm not particularly close) about another doctoral student, she pointed out that he was very single and quite handsome. I replied that I really wasn’t interested, but she insisted, “Well, SW, you never know what might happen if you just give it a chance.”

Umm…with all due respect, ma’am, my personal life isn’t any of your business.

Most recently, I read this post. And I suppose that it was the proverbial straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back.

Hence, this post.

Please don’t misunderstand me: I am not opposed to the institution of marriage. In fact, I think that marriage has the potential to be a wonderful experience. But I carefully determined what I wanted most out of life and the life that I want is incompatible with marriage.

Thus, I choose to be single.

This means that I am not single because I am inherently unattractive to members of the opposite sex. And I am not single because there is something psychologically wrong with me. And I am not single because I made some kind of error in my decision-making process.

I am single because I choose to be.

Certainly, all of these experiences are only exacerbated by the fact that I desperately miss living at The School, where I was surrounded by a community of people who also chose to remain single and who, therefore, truly understood both the costs and the benefits of choosing singleness.

So, when I tell you that I’m single, please don’t assume that I’m seeking to change my marital status and offer to introduce me to someone. And please don’t proceed to treat me as though I have not yet reached adulthood simply because I haven’t started a family. And, whatever you do, don’t comfort me with your certainty that The Right Guy is just around the corner.

Otherwise, when you tell me that you’re married, I’ll offer my condolences.