Thirty--and Single
MY friends are watching me closely these days, closely and carefully, for I am a source of peculiar behaviorisms and mannerisms. Any day now I am likely to do something entirely irrational — even horrible. And the reason for all this concern is (I say it softly) that I am thirty and still single.
Ever since that fatal thirtieth birthday which found me with no husband more or less securely attached, I have been a different person. Those things I did with impunity before I was thirty are now just further indications of the terrible state into which I have fallen. When I was twentynine I could wipe the noses and wash the faces of dozens of dirty urchins without exciting any comment. Now, if I so much as give a youngster a friendly pat, I am trying to satisfy a ‘ thwarted maternal instinct.’ If I remark how lucky this or that friend is to have two lovely children, if I like to wander through the doll section of a department store, it is that maternal instinct showing itself again.
I wonder where I kept it all these years? Perhaps it was just sitting around quietly, waiting for that thirtieth birthday; now it can show itself and chortle, ‘ I’ m your thwarted maternal instinct. Don’t pretend you don’t know me. All your acquaintances say my place is with you. Better be satisfied with me and say nothing.’ Until now I have not complained.
Just when I had become accustomed to the thwarted maternal instinct, I discovered I was supposed to be neurotic. It all happened this way. It had been a terrible week, one disappointment and trial after another, and I sat down to have a good oldfashioned cry, the kind I used to have before I was thirty. But did I receive a kindly pat on the back and encouraging words as formerly I did? I did not. Now they tell me I am neurotic when I cry. When I was twenty-nine I could sob for no reason at all, and nothing was thought of it. Now I must do all my weeping at a dark movie where all my friends are too busy wipingaway their own tears to notice my neurotic tendencies.
Now that I am thirty, my friends are sure there is nothing in life I want more than a husband. They tell me I must be very circumspect and careful, for, after thirty, so strong is the desire for a mate that a young woman will take any man — object matrimony. This is rather surprising news to hear about myself, and I hasten to explain that since turning thirty I have refused a proposal of marriage. At that explanation, my friends shake their heads and say compassionately yet reprovingly, ‘Well, you’re getting too particular. After thirty a girl thinks no man is good enough for her.’ And they look at me as if they secretly thought I was doing a little prevaricating. Yes, when a woman is twentynine she may refuse a proposal of marriage and be sane; but if she refuses after she is thirty, her mind is slightly unbalanced.
Sometimes I feel my well-meaning friends are a little disappointed when I fail to appreciate their efforts to find a life partner for me. And when at some party, during which their attempts at matchmaking have been very obvious and crude, I remonstrate with them, they subside a little ungraciously. But I know it is not to be for long. After my departure they will talk about me and resolve to do something to show me the errors of my ways. My hostess will say, ‘I can’t see how it is that Alice never married. She’s a rather good-looking girl, dresses well, is talented and agreeable enough. She probably has some peculiar ideas about marriage. It really is a shame. Before she knows it she will be one of those funny old maids, and no one will want to marry her.’
By the time the last guest has departed, I shall have been completely psychoanalyzed according to Freud, Adler, and a dozen others. My complexes will have been brought out for inspection, criticism, diagnosis, and prognosis; I shall have been given credit for several kinds of neuroses, dangerous and harmless. And as my hostess prepares for bed she will most likely say to a sleepy and bored mate, ‘Well, if Alice is going to persist in acting the way she does, I’m not going to bother any more about her. I’ve done all I could for her.’
In some devious manner she will again impart that news to someone who will be sure to forward it to me, and I shall sit and wonder if I deserve all this censure. I shall think and think, but no solution to the problem will come except this: I am thirty — and single!
ALICE ORDWAY