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When the New York Times reported Tuesday that 51 percent of women now live without a spouse, women were not exactly getting out the hankies to weep at the death of an institution. They were, instead, high-fiving each other.
The article concerned 2005 census results wherein 51 percent of women said they were now living spouselessly.
I bet some of those women were even single.
I mean, heaven, Hollywood, and Madison Avenue know that even those of us with husbands occasionally find they've gone missing - which is why I'm lobbying for GPS devices to be installed whenever a man over 30 gets (1) nervous at the idea of intimacy with his spouse or (2) his ear pierced.
The question, far as I can see, isn't why more women aren't marrying; the question is why they marry at all. Helen Rowland once said that "when you see what some girls marry, you realize how they must hate to work for a living." But then, she was writing more than 100 years ago. Fact is, there are better gigs than marriage out there for women these days - in a few of them, even a remote possibility they'll get within striking distance of a man's salary.
Although the Beach Boys vowed in "Wouldn't It Be Nice" that "we could be married/ then we'd be happy," and the Dixie Cups' hit "Chapel of Love" declared that once we crossed the threshold in a white dress, "we'd never be lonely anymore," it turns out that neither promise has been enough to persuade most women in America to give an adult man a copy of their house keys. Maybe that's because women grew up singing, "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow" while men grew up singing, "We've Got Tonight (Why Don't You Stay)."
The culture has changed in the last 100 years, to be sure; reliable birth control has probably made more of a difference than anything else, as has our increasing life expectancy. But other factors are also significant. The very terms we use to describe the institution of marriage have altered. Younger women are more likely than their counterparts in previous generations to agree publicly with Mae West's assertion that "marriage is a great institution, but I'm not ready for an institution yet" or to echo Lizz Winstead (co-creator and former head writer of The Daily Show) when asked why she's unmarried: "I think, therefore I'm single."
Still, the old ideas hang on. When I hit 13 back in 1970, my mom told me I should start thinking about marriage because a mate would offer me support. (She made a husband sound like an underwire bra.) He would help rein me in and keep me in control (sort of like a girdle). He would help disguise my imperfections (like a slip). Men, from my mother's perspective, were basically one big foundation garment - something you should make use of once your secondary sex characteristics became apparent. You wouldn't think of walking down the street without one.
And many women still harbor (to various degrees, ranging from mild apprehension to gothic obsession) the traditional fear of becoming spinsters. Old maid once conjured up images of Donna Reed's terrifyingly single doppelgänger in It's a Wonderful Life.
Indeed, popular culture - the film/TV world especially - is doing all it can to keep alive the worst social clichés of the past. When women over age 26 or over size 8 are depicted as unmarried, they are most often played by Kathy Bates - or Martin Lawrence. If they're thin and unmarried, they're depicted as predatory and played by Glenn Close or Sharon Stone. If they are young and unmarried... well, by the credits, they won't be.
Single men remain delectable, however, no matter what shape they're in. I'm not talking only George Clooney here. Any man with a steady job, a history of reasonable sobriety, and the ability to cook one signature meal (either a red gravy for pasta, which they refer to as a "Bolognese" sauce, or a stir fry made in a wok they got from their last girlfriend) can find a woman willing to marry him. Guys who look like Notre Dame gargoyles can find wives who look like Isabella Rossellini. Think Everybody Loves Raymond. Think The King of Queens. Think The Simpsons. Meantime, women who look like Christie Brinkley get dumped for 17-year-olds who work at ShopRite or hookers named Divine Brown.
But in the non-screen world, it may be that women have turned the Donna Reed image of singlehood inside-out. Perhaps women are learning that being alone in a relationship is far worse than being alone not in one. (A friend of mine once told me she'd never remarry: single, she can make herself feel inadequate whenever she needs to without having to watch football or, for that matter, her weight.) More and more, being unmarried is a sign that a woman is in control of her life.
Once the culture at large accepts this - that we marry, and stay in marriages, only if we wish to - perhaps husbands will once again get out the woks and work to woo their wives. Some wives might be reassured by the idea that they can remain in a marriage out of desire for their husbands' company rather than half their husbands' companies.
Marriage, like dessert, is wonderful if you choose to indulge, but it isn't essential. Remember, too, that when the Bible declared it "not good for man to be alone," it didn't say anything about woman.
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