You Will Meet Someone

I remember one time, when I was a little girl, I met somebody in a mall. She told me that everybody has a special person fated for them, and that was their future spouse.

Even as a girl, I thought that was bullshit, and I told her so (I did not use the word ‘bullshit’ because I was not old enough to use such language, but that’s what I meant). My parents have never been married, so that were pretty clear evidence that some people were not fated to marry a star-crossed spouse.

I remember one time, on a car trip, I mentioned that I never kissed anybody on the lips. Somebody else answered ‘Oh, you will, you will, it will happen’.

I remember one time, the subject of marriage came up:

Me: I do not want to get married.
Other person: Why not?
Me: I do not know anybody I want to marry.
Other person: You will meet someone.
Me: How do you know?
[At this point the other person had to actually think about this, and realized that, no, she does not know that I ‘will meet someone’]

I think the people who say things like to me have good intentions, and in situations #2 and #3 I think they were trying to reassure me. Society teaches us that we must get married to be happy, so people assume that the prospect I might never marry must make me unhappy.

The reality? It does not reassure me at all. It is because people make comments like this all the time that people get the idea that marriage is the key to happiness … even though it’s not. Marriage sometimes makes people happy, but it does not always make people happy, and many people are happy without it. And when people make comments like this, I feel society trying to squeeze me into some generic mold so I become an indistinct cog in the system instead of letting me express my humanity in my own way. I’m pretty resistant to this type of pressure – even as a little girl, I thought it was pretty ridiculous, but that doesn’t mean I want people to keep on pouring this crap on me.

Now, I have not taken a vow of celibacy, or even a vow to remain unmarried (though it would be very difficult to persuade me to get married – I would need some awfully compelling reasons). I think it’s okay if I do end up meeting someone I want to marry, and I think it’s okay if I don’t. I do not know if I will meet someone, and neither do you. Please stop saying it.