I Will Never Settle for Just a Man
Why I choose spinsterhood
Before I dive into explaining the meaning behind my maybe controversial title, let me share with you an excerpt from an interview Eartha Kitt gave in 1982 with filmmaker Christian Blackwood while speaking on relationships:
CB: If a man came into your life, wouldn’t you want to compromise?
EK: [hysterical laughter] Stupid! [more hysterical laughter] A man comes into my life and I have to compromise? You must think about that man again. [even more hysterical laughter] A man comes into my life and [I] have to compromise? For what?
Putting aside the fact that Eartha Kitt has, just, the best voice (honestly, I could listen to her reading the dictionary for hours), she is also very clearly and concisely putting into words something I have always felt but never been able to express: romantic love and partnership is not the end-all, be-all. It’s not the key to happiness.
It used to scare me, the idea that I would never fall in love with a man, have a man fall in love with me, that I would be alone forever. It’s always been drilled into me, by my family and friends, by television and magazines, sometimes subconsciously and sometimes overtly, that finding love is the ultimate goal. Though we’ve come a long way as a society (for instance, marriage and…
