Happy Ladies
Happiness is elusive but sadness is right around the corner if you are over 40 and never been married. Or so we have been told. The “crazy cat lady trope” has sunken deep into the U.S. imaginary making it nearly impossible to imagine a single woman over 40 who is genuinely happy. And yet, there are countless examples of women living their best lives without ever having said “I do”. Strong, independent women like Isabel Prades who is 44 but you would never know that just by looking at the youthful non-profit director. She tells us that, “[she] has had her fair share of long term committed relationships” but none of those partners ended up being her husband. While we may think of this as failure, she would disagree. “I never wanted to be in a relationship just for the relationship’s sake” she tells us. She has simply removed the time constraint society puts on women due to biological reasons. She is hopeful about finding Mr. Right one day but until that day comes, she will indulge in yoga, meditation sessions and lots of independence. Kate Bolick, the writer of the NYT best seller “Spinster” tells us that single women are often the “social glue” that hold friendships together since they do not have the same responsibilities that married women with children have.
She goes on to say that unattached women “contribute more” than married women due to their independence and availability of time to be politically active and have better paying jobs on average than their married counterparts. “If you look at never marrieds who are high on mastery -- they feel like they are in the driver's seat and in control of their lives -- and high on self-sufficiency -- they know how to take care of themselves -- they actually have better emotional well-being than married people," said study author Jamila Bookwala, an associate professor of psychology at Lafayette College in Easton. This control enabled Ms. Bolick to forgo marriage in pursuit of a graduate degree and a high powered career in journalism which ultimately led to her best-selling book. She is quick to put an asterisk on her marriage status however because she is “single” in the eyes of the law but in a committed relationship with a man at the moment. After all, not being married does not mean being alone. For more on this, we talked to Amilia Johnson. She is a 71 year old woman living in a retirement community in Virginia. She was never married. Her infectious smile shines on all the members of her retirement community. When asked about her dating life, she said, “there is a man I spend time with and enjoy talking to”. She tells us, she enjoys “not being dependent on anyone”. This independence idea is a common denominator between all the women we interviewed. On her free time, Amelia can be found practicing water aerobics, yoga and tai chi.
Happiness is not monopolized by married women though society constantly lets us to believe otherwise. You indeed can be happy and never married just as much as you can be a happy wife. These women do not look down on married women but simply put forward an argument that you can achieve happiness even if you never marry. There haven’t been many studies focusing on unmarried women and their happiness. Probably because many of those women are too busy having fulfilling lives and enjoying their independence. However, from our anecdotal evidence, it is more than possible to be happy and over forty. And if you think these women do not actually exist, it is time that you met one.
