Waiting

I have been thinking a lot lately about the "older" singles that I know, in particular the girls (mainly because I don't know that many guys). I can't even begin to explain where the cut off for when you become "older," so I am just going to assume it begins around 24 or 25. A lot of people would probably argue that it is younger, but I think it is absolutely ridiculous to say that a 23-year-old who is not married is old, so you are just going to have to deal with my personal bias on that one. What I see when I look at the older single girls is a mix of two things. The first group of older single girls are professional, bright, independent, attractive and personable. They have gone out into the world, have made a life for themselves, are improving themselves and those around them daily. They look forward to getting married, but they don't allow the fact that they are not married steop them from making a life for themselves. The second group doesn't necessarily lack the above qualities, but they seem to embody one extra attribute - that is aura of "waiting." These girls are "waiting" for marriage. They are waiting to move out of their parents' houses, waiting to begin the next stage of their life, waiting to have a baby, always waiting. A lot of those in the second group talk about their high school days as the halcyon years, their friendships haven't moved much beyond that time, even though they are now ten years or more older. The only thing I can figure out is, they expected to be married shortly after high school, and then they would start their "real" lives as a part of a family. So the fact that they have not yet gotten married has caused them to stop in mid-air and run in place. I did the waiting thing for a few years. Then I realized that I couldn't wait forever to fulfill my dreams. I couldn't wait for things to fall into place (until I got married) to go back to school, to make a life for myself. I realized that maybe the vision of my future isn't what is going to happen. I had to move on and start carving out a different future. I am no longer waiting to get married before I do things in my life. This doesn't mean I want to get married less than those other girls, it simply means that I realize that I don't want to put my entire life on hold while I wait for one aspect of it to come. I don't look down on those girls who are waiting. Unfortunately, I think that the world they grew up in makes it extremely difficult to see life as whole during that period after high school and before marriage. I hope that they can find in themselves that they are whole with or without a husband.