"Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance"

It's summer. At least in the life of an aspiring school teacher-cache county school district, if you are reading this my students refer to me as captain, my captain. Hire me! Don't you love the dash-Emily Dickinson eat your heart out! But I digress...Oh, because it is summer I am reading a lot of books of a wide variety-stick with me, there is a point here-one of which has also been the inspiration of my rantings and thoughts. Yesterday I was at lunch with a fellow spinster-and I say that with the greatest sincerity-and the current book I am perusing came up in conversation. *Disclaimer: I am a cynic. Blame it on my father, my no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealin'-great-great-grandfather, or my choice of study at college, I don't care. The truth is, I have a hard time not being skeptical. That being said, I know passive voice (If you haven't guessed it by now, I want to be an English teacher, but I break all of the rules), I was complaining to my favorite spinster about the nature of this novel. I will not disclose the title of the work as I am sure I would have a hound of angry loyalists, my aunt being one of them, searching for my address so they can come slit my neck in the night. I don't like it. It is so degrading and chauvinistic, even though it is written by a woman. All the characters care about is getting married. A new man moves to town and all the single ladies start going all "Mean girls" on each other to gain his hand in marriage. Barf. Their is more to life than marriage, right? Wrong. As my eloquent friend pointed out at lunch, "In our world, being single is like a disease. Everyone thinks something is wrong with us and they can't wait to fix it." Do you know what it is like to be asked at every family function about your dating life? If you are a fellow twenty-something spinster you do. Never mind the fact that I am brilliant, according to my mom and that history professor that reminds me of my dad, I am talented, freakin' hilarious, a college graduate, and a world traveler-I recently returned from Madison, WI, believe me, its a whole 'nother world over there. Let's talk about the novel I want to write, my greatest fears, my next trip-I'm thinking going old school on a train-or my exercise plan, anything that will keep me from seeing your face contort into what I can only imagine is your fart face as you attempt to keep that disappointed look in your eyes from being obvious when I tell you that I am currently not seeing someone..."When you say you are seeing Penny, what exactly do you mean?" Disclaimer #2: I tend to throw in random movie and television quotes. I cannot for the life of me remember the word "collaborate" in an important job interview, but I can tell you the plot line of just about every episode of my favorite television show or movie. Which brings me to the title of this post. That novel that I told you about. It has started to grow on me like a tumor that turns out to be your twin that you consumed in the womb and as such I have decided to pay tribute to its glorious lines by including them where I can in my posts. Brownie points to whoever can guess the novel. Sorry mom, you are out of the game. Oh yeah, to finish my thoughts about the conversation I had with my fellow leprous-lady, we are happy. We love being single. Yes, we want our prince charming to come and sweep us off our feet. We want our lime jello laden, mini van drivin' eternal bliss. But we also recognize that some people are like a fine baby sharp cheddar, they taste better with age and are worth the wait. So for all you aunts, uncles, and creepy cousins out there, the next time you saddle up to your twenty-something spinster cousin, before you spray your partially masticated frog-eye salad on her new dress as you open your mouth to ask her when the big day is, remember, you may be married, but she can travel around the world without a sippy cup in her purse or a vomit stain on her blouse. Ask her what fun plans she has for the summer and hurry home because you know how cranky junior gets when Mr. Bear keeps him up past nine o'clock.