Is it really possible to be a happy spinster?
As a controversial book says women who’ve never wed should treasure their freedom...
CAN a spinster ever be truly happy or fulfilled without a man or children in her life? This is being furiously debated after the publication of Kate Bolick’s controversial new book, which argues that modern singletons are actually content with their lot. But is the author of Spinster: Making A Life Of One’s Own deluded — or on to something? Here, three spinsters give their views . . . NO! THE FUN STOPS IN YOUR FIFTIES
Kate Mulvey, 51, says: AS I stood in the middle of the room, my eyes pricked with tears and mustering all my strength not to cry, I felt a gaping sense of loss.
I was not at the funeral of a loved one, but at my friend’s son’s tenth birthday party, and I was the only woman there without an army of squabbling brats and a man to call my own.
Most of my friends were there, a medley of middle-aged couples, settled around the kitchen table, content and relaxed as they swapped in-jokes about truculent teenagers and the grind of GCSEs.
Amid the hubbub, I was shouting into my mobile, organising my Saturday night ahead. I laughed and joked about yet another date, but my laughter was empty, merely a mechanism to cover up the loneliness I felt.
After all, I am 51, and quite honestly, I’d much rather be spending a cosy night in with a husband and children than running around like the teenager I so obviously am not.
Yet, according to U.S. author Kate Bolick, I should be out and proud, enjoying my exciting single lifestyle. Her book, part memoir and part eulogy to the state of spinsterhood, challenges the idea that women who don’t marry are somehow sad and pathetic.
Being single, she says, shouldn’t be seen as a default position for we modern bachelorettes, but a life choice, a conscious decision to exist independently and self-sufficiently.
I used to think like Bolick and even wrote articles about living an unconventional life that was unfettered and free. But who was I kidding? Myself, actually.
Because the idea of being able to have a happy, fulfilled life on your own is a myth. I can’t tell you how many times I have come home to a cold house and an empty bed and felt utterly dejected and scared.
Yes, I may be able to eat chocolate profiteroles in bed, watch daytime soaps and drink mojitos in the bath — the usual arguments trotted out by the Bridget Jones generation. But, as pleasurable as all this may be, I know I’d enjoy it far more if I shared it with someone I loved.
Which is why Bolick’s premise that life can be lived more fully on your own — she even writes of finding herself yearning, when with a man, for ‘the extravagant pleasures of simply being alone’ — seems to me like a slow-burning recipe for unhappiness.
I wonder if Bolick has factored in what will happen when old age catches up with her. The fact is, she is still in her early 40s, stunning with tumbling locks and full lips. Wait till the lips are puckered and the cheeks sunken. I often wake in the night terrified no man will ever want me again.
Because — and here’s the nub — Bolick’s feminist mantra of ‘If bachelorhood can be celebrated, why not spinsterhood?’ is simply naive. I am sorry, but as cruel as it is, being single different for women. It’s unfair, even disgustingly so, but it is also true.
Only the other day I was at my local bar chatting to a group of men in their early 60s. They listened to me attentively, until a blonde thirty-something wafted in. One even managed to arrange a date with her. And it is not only dating disappointments we midlife singletons have to contend with. I also wonder, with no children of my own and growing health niggles, who will look after me as I age?
And as if that wasn’t enough, there is the problem of ageing parents. Five years ago, my mother was diagnosed with vascular dementia. My sisters, with their many child-centric responsibilities, left the bulk of caring duties to me. As my father pointed out, it wasn’t as if I had any family commitments. And he was right.
When she passed away this time last year, it was my job to look after my devastated father. To make him his favourite meals, sit and chat about the happy times and have the hankies ready when the tears came.
I don’t resent it, and am happy to be useful. But to be honest, it is a bit like landing the booby prize. Never in a million years did I ever think my life would end up like this. It is far from the footloose ‘living on your own terms’ that Bolick talks about.
So I am sorry to contradict the author and her merry army of glad- to- be- single followers, because it may seem glamorous, glossy and daring now, but come a certain age, being on your own is simply sad and lonely.
No, we spinsters, don’t need to be pitied or laughed at, but neither do we need to pretend to ourselves and the world we are having a ball. Because we’re not.
YES! MARRIED FRIENDS ENVY ME
Claudia Connell, 48, says: SHOW me any unmarried woman over the age of 35 and I’ll show you somebody who has been told that she’s ‘ too fussy’ more times than she’ll care to remember.
In the bizarre and baffling world of human relationships, being choosy about the person you want to spend your life with is considered a bad thing.
Be fussy about your choice of sofa, or where to go on holiday, by all means. But when it comes to the single most important decision you’ll ever make in your life, the message seems to be: just settle down. Anything is better than nothing. Don’t end up on the shelf.
I clearly recall in my late 30s (when I was just perching on the shelf but not beyond rescue) dating a man I had doubts about. He was nice enough, but wasn’t much fun and never made me laugh. I lost count of the number of friends and relatives who urged me to ignore the fact he was a little dull because ‘I was cracking on and he had a good job’.
‘You’ve got your friends to have fun with. He’ll get snapped up if you let him go,’ was the consensus. I did let him go and they were right — he was snapped up.
I wondered, then, if I would later regret some of the decisions I made about boyfriends. Now, at 48 years old, I can say I don’t.
I’m glad, and rather proud, that I didn’t allow myself to feel pressured or panicked into being with somebody who didn’t feel right, as so many of my friends did.
In fact, the very same women who urged me to be less fussy are now the ones who tell me how much they envy my life.
They’re the ones stuck at home with moody teenagers who won’t leave home until they’re 30 and a
boring, lazy husband they don’t seem to even like, let alone love.
I have freedom, a good amount of disposable income and only myself to please. I know who I think got the better deal.
Today, about one in four women in the UK will be single by the time they hit 40. It’s crazy to think it’s because none had the opportunity to marry. Today’s modern, selfsupporting woman doesn’t feel the need to get married out of duty, fear or social pressure.
Like all the unmarried women I know, I am not anti-marriage. I’m just anti ‘any old marriage’.
The question I am asked most often is whether I worry about growing old alone with no children to look after me. Yes I do. But having children doesn’t mean they will be on hand to take care of you, as I’ve recently witnessed with one elderly neighbour who hasn’t seen hide nor hair of her son since her stroke last summer.
The good news is that once you are over the age of 45, the pep talks about being too fussy tail off. The bad news is this is when the pity kicks in.
Yet all my spinster friends in their 40s and 50s are strong, feisty women who are still as proudly fussy as they ever were.
Sadly, some people just can’t seem to make their peace with the idea that a woman can be unmarried and happy. It’s the reason why, with every birthday that passes, the number of ‘joke’ cards I receive depicting an old crone surrounded by mangy cats increases.
But as I look at friends trapped in miserable marriages, I rather feel the joke is on them.
YES! MEN ARE JUST SELFISH GLUTTONS
Melissa Kite, 43, says: AS A little girl, I dreamed of a white wedding dress. It wasn’t until I actually ordered one, 30 years later, that I realised the truth — I didn’t want to be anyone’s wife. I called off my wedding in a panic ten years ago in what I now realise was an act of self-sabotage.
Since then, every failed attempt at a romantic relationship has only confirmed the suspicion I had then: for me, marriage would be like forcing a round peg into a square hole.
Reading Kate Bolick’s engrossing memoir, I am more convinced than ever that being unmarried by choice is a growing and legitimate trend.
When she eulogises the ‘extravagant pleasures’ of being alone, Bolick speaks for many women who are solo not because we’ve been passed over by men — but because we have passed men over.
We are capable, high- earning women who are opting for a life alone because we prefer it. Alone, not lonely. There’s a difference. Yesterday, I woke up, sauntered to an Italian deli for coffee, walked the dog, did some work, drove to the country and rode my horses, drove back into town, popped a chicken in the oven, watered the garden while it cooked.
After dinner, I sat in my immaculate living room and read a gripping thriller in perfect peace and quiet. Finally, I made a cup of herbal tea and slipped between the crisp white sheets of my king-size bed with my spaniel curled up beside me. Perfection.
If you ask me how that same day would have passed with any of my last three ex-boyfriends, my answer would be: somewhat tediously, very stressfully, and with hidden tears of frustration.
I would have been drawn into a dozen logistical nightmares over accommodating his life before I could even think about mine. He would have wanted a far more complicated dinner than chicken with salad. I would have had to make pudding. I hate pudding.
We would have watched a bad movie until the early hours, too bored and fed up with each other after a day of niggling over the small stuff to even try to have sex.
Now, I ask you, what’s in it for me to live like that?
I suppose, you would say, companionship or the joy of children. The problem is I have never had a great yearning for babies and my friends make great companions.
People say ‘Oh, but what will you do when you’re old?’ But whenever I’ve been ill, boyfriends have been useless. I have always ended up texting a girlfriend for help.
Men suffer too much from ‘openbeak syndrome’ to care for women when they’re in need. No matter what happens in a woman’s day, it’s all about what he wants for dinner.
As for the financial position, I get the impression that as girls achieve more academically, increasingly numbers of women are earning more than most men they date.
That is a double-edged sword, as women are finding themselves the target of gold-diggers. Men have suffered this for centuries, of course, but whenever I meet a penniless man, I find myself thinking ‘Not so fast, Sunshine’. I haven’t been careful all my life so that I can be taken for a ride, as have several female friends.
The fact is, women are evolving. We will look back one day and think it was ridiculous we used to feel pressured into marriage.
Women are more independent than men, the stronger sex when it comes to both caring and crises.
Isn’t it the lionesses of the pack who do most of the hunting?
Maybe marriage made sense in the days when women couldn’t own property or vote. But now we are financially independent and free to achieve more than ever in our working lives, why on earth would we shackle ourselves to someone who is constantly asking ‘What’s for dinner?’