Cherry Vodka, Bardzo Słodka

That rhyme only works in Pol-Eng, which is my personal mix of Polish and Polish. Bardzo słodka means very sweet, and I have stuffed 500 g of cherries in a big jar and poured 700 mL of vodka on top. In a few weeks, I will see how they are doing, and then decide upon a sweetening method. I don't want my cherry vodka tincture to become TOO sweet.

I really love this store, but I don't love their prices, so I shall begin my own line of tinctures for home consumption and Christmas presents.

When I was Single I never, ever drank alone because I had heard too many stories of elderly widows and widowers becoming alcoholics in their old age by drinking alone. And, really, alcohol is not really a thing in my family, drinkers of milk, except when they are on holiday--at least, when they are on holiday in Britain. Then they drink enough wine and gin to float a boat, and the Master of the Men's Schola loves to remind me of my claim that that my family drinks one measly bottles of wine together a year (Christmas).

I have never really seen the point of drinking alone, or being tipsy alone. It's one of those activities (and states) best with friends and family. When alone, I prefer a nice cup of tea, or a coffee, or even a nice steaming cup of broth.

My Day in Victory Rolls

Oh, poppets. I have discovered what makes you look weirder than a punk rocker or a Goth, and it is a 1940s hairdo, especially if you have long hair. As I looked at myself in the hairdresser's mirror, my little heart sank. I sported modified 1940s hairdos in elementary school, when rollers fixed my fuzzy hair into smooth waves for Picture Days, but this was much, much worse. Instead of two balanced victory rolls, I had one huge victory roll and two pin curls on either side. I crept out of the salon half-expecting to be accosted by school bullies. Taxi!

However, I am not in school but a grown-up and I spent the day inside grown-up Summerhall listening to very grown-up topics as part of the Polish Scottish Heritage Festival.

The first lecture was Scottish Nationalist Party propaganda disguised with a thin veneer of history. The lecture was supposed to be about Scottish migration in the 16th to early 18th centuries to Poland, i.e. between the early days of the Scottish Reformation and the Union of Scotland and England. What economic factors sent the Protestant Scots to Poland, you might ask. Terrible restrictions because pre-union Scotland was in direct competition with powerhouse England? And what economic factors following upon the Union stopped Scots from going there, you might also ask. Astonishing Scottish economic growth? And although what I wanted to do was pass unnoticed (if such a thing was possible, given the size of my victory roll), I did ask these questions. AND DID NOT BL**DY WELL GET STRAIGHT ANSWERS. Because the whole point of the lecture was not to discuss historical realities but to exploit Polish sympathies for nationalism to get more "Yes" votes for the separatist referendum.

I asked the only questions because the other "questions" were actually just other Scotsmen listening to themselves talk, and I do not recall which one it was who tried to draw parallels between Scotland's role in the United Kingdom with the three partitions of Poland, but the speaker certainly did not say that was a stretch. Seven of Britain's Prime Ministers have been born in Scotland; pretending Scots have been groaning under foreign domination since 1707 is ahistorical, an insult and a lie. Not only is it an insult to generations of Scots in Britain, and to Britain in general, but an insult to generations of Poles who suffered in ways the vast majority of Scots born since 1707 could not possibly imagine. How interesting that Poles continue to be exploited, this time by Scottish pseudo-intellectuals prostituting history for their "Yes" votes.*

The speaker was wearing a "YES" button--believe me, it was THAT obvious. I was so angry, I thought the rest of the day would be ruined for me. First I had mad hair, and second the Scots Nats seemed to have hijacked the Scottish Polish Heritage Festival. However, I then heard two excellent testimonies from Scots about Polish experiences in the Second World War and after, in Poland and Scotland. One Scot had a Polish father, and the other had aided Polish displaced persons in Germany in the 1950s and become a Polonophile. The latter wrote a series of short stories, and I was so impressed by her reading that I bought her book. The former's book sounded interesting, too, but he hogged the question period as the woman sat there quietly, so he lost my buyer's sympathy.

Next was an American film called "The Officer's Wife", about the Katyn massacre and the deportation of two million Poles to Siberia. It was very good although natually very depressing. I was curious about the voice given to the actress reading the memoirs of filmmaker's Polish-Chicago grandmother; it sounded neither Polish nor Chicago. It was also political, but at least it wasn't a cheap ploy to get the Poles living in Scotland to vote against the Union (which is not, IMHO) in their economic or political interests AT ALL. No, the film is 100% anti-Soviet and 99.99% anti-current Russian regime, which--given the events described by the film--is fair enough.

Then there was a concert in the main hall by Polish folk singers, which was very loud and reminded me that, although I am a huge fan of Polish pop music of the interwar--and war--period, and have a soft spot for the 1950s stuff (condemned by Polish Pretend Son as Stalinist forced cheer), and enjoy Disco Polo and other modern Polish stuff (and Chopin), I do not like village stuff. I really do not like Polish village stuff. I dislike it so much, I wrote a note to remind myself because every time I think I will like it this time, I do not. And as the room was very crowded with enthusiastic Polish folk music lovers, and I already stuck out like a sore victory roll, I couldn't escape. Oh dear. But at least that wasn't anti-British either. And when it was done, I tied a scarf around my head, like your great-grandmothers, and went out into the outside world for coffee.

My self-confidence improved drastically an hour or so later when I put on my 1940s gear in the Summerhall toilet reserved for the disabled. I had proper 1940s corsetry (squeeeeeze) and tights with lines down the back. I had a long black dress that could have been from the 1940s, black gloves and shoes of a rather 1940s-looking design. I had chunky rhinestone jewellery. Above all, I had brown eyeshadow with which to 1940sfy my eyebrows and super-dark red lipstick. And so I no longer looked simply peculiar but like a 40-something woman in 1940.

The reason many of us all think we look young for our age is because nothing was as aging to our grandmothers and great-grandmothers as the great divide between Maidens' Clothes and Matrons' Clothes. Once upon a time, once you were of a certain age, you HAD to stop dressing like a young woman. And, lo, if you were over thirty in 1940 you might have looked like this:

My mother says I looked magnificent and my hair is just like that of my grandmother in a photo my mother keeps on her mirror, but she has not offered it to my view as proof. Frankly, I thought I was not going to make a very good wingwoman for my Single pal after all, for surely the male reaction to my hair would be to fall about laughing.

But no. After supper and the Katy Carr concert, there was a swing dance, and at this dance I was suddenly SEIZED by a Polish Pretend Pilot (out of uniform) of about 60 and made to swing-dance all over the floor. He had a huge grey moustache and was delicately scented with tobacco and was reluctant to speak in either Polish or English, but I thought I would introduced him to my Single pal anyway. At first she did not look happy with this, for although our saviour from wallflowerdom was an excellent dancer, he was also familiarly affectionate, as if we were his long-lost grand-daughters.

Personally, I expect to be squeezed just a little too much and kissed soundly on the cheek or forehead by slightly tipsy cigarette smokers I have never met before on the dance floor. It is the price one pays for partner dancing. Indeed, I bet generations of women would agree with me, although nobody would admit it. However, my pal is a little more fastidious, so she looked rather irked, but she is also endlessly forgiving, so she may have forgotten about the over-squeezing and face-kissing already.

So after we had both been rescued from wallflowerdom, we went to the bar fashioned out of a room across the hall. The Scots barman had three bottles of vodka behind him, but he literally thought I was joking when I asked for mine straight. He even laughed. "They told me this one goes with apple juice," he said, so I had my zubrowka with apple juice, and it was actually very good. It also gave me the courage for my next wingwoman manoeuvre, so pay attention.

"We must dance with younger men," said I to my Single Pal. She agreed and bewailed the new male tendency not to ask women they don't know to dance. Primed with vodka, I looked around the room for anyone I knew, even slightly. But the only person I knew was Kasia, who looked great, by the way. However, I did recognize one of the men as someone who goes to various of Kasia's Polish poetry events, so I carted my Single Pal along to where he was talking to another youngish man, and I said, "Hey! I know you! You're a friend of Kasia's!"

This of course flies in the face of "The Rules", but I did not care because, being married, I am not interested in male strangers at parties as anyone other than men who might ask my Single Pals to dance. If great cosmic punishment falls upon those who talk to strange men at parties, it will fall on me, not on my innocent Single Pals. Perhaps this is one reason why Single Girls should have Married Pal friends. The caveat is that the Married Pal shouldn't look too obviously married and as if she were merely trying to marry off her Single friend. No, no, no. The Married Pal must look interested in whomever for himself, so that if he shrinks from her brazenness, her friend will look better by comparison. If he recoils with maidenly disgust, the really Single friend can roll her eyes in sympathy and apology and thus create a BOND of shared feeling with the cute stranger.

"Which Kasia?" asked the Polish guy, smirking. "I have two friends here named Kasia."

Oooh. Polish surnames. You know, I see them on Facebook, but it is years before I actually sound them out to myself, let alone memorize them. Faking your way through them is not really an option but...

"Kasia Kokosanka", I claimed.

The Polish guy laughed and well he might, for kokosanka, I have since discovered, means coconut cake.

"That's not her name," he said, chortling away.

"So what is it?" I asked, and as he could not remember, I said he had a lot of nerve laughing at me in that case. I then introduced him to my Single Pal, and eventually he asked her to dance. Ta-dah! (Victory roll.)

I then talked to his non-Polish pal, and eventually asked him to dance, as I cannot resist Irving Berlin songs, and had a marvelous time. My Single Pal may have helpfully corrected any potential misunderstandings by mentioning, when the non-Polish pal made inquiries, that I was married. I think I was back in the arms of Mr Squeezy Moustache at the time.

At 11:15 or so, the crowd had thinned out a bit, and my Single Pal and I rushed off to our respective buses which, conveniently, came to the same stop almost simultaneously. And so I was safely home by midnight, and instead of facing dismay that his wife had run about town with attention-getting hair, Benedict Ambrose took a lot of photos.

"Did that really only cost forty pounds?" he asked, which as you may discover, is one of the nicest things a husband can say, combining flattery about your looks with the assertion that they didn't cost you that much. (Second victory roll!)

*Poles resident in Scotland can vote for or against the Union in September's Scottish so-called "independence" referendum. No-one living in any other part of the UK, including those born in Scotland of Scottish parentage, can vote. Four million people, including 16 year olds and people not born anywhere in the UK (including me), get to make a decision that will potentially worsen the lives of sixty-two million people. Nice, eh? Before the SNP got into power, "independence", never mind Scottish republicanism, was a fringe interest. IMHO this whole stramash is a vanity project for Scottish politicians without the talent or clout to get anywhere in the Union as a whole. As I said, at least seven Scots have been Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom, a major first world power. Why we're going to chuck this in... Oh well. If the economy collapes, B.A. and I can always go to Canada, and the Poles can always go back to Poland or to England, which I hope would weather the storm.

Laetare Sterilis

It is Monday after the Laetare Sunday before, and oh but do I have a lot of dishes still to wash! But it was a lovely day, from the glorious rose vestments to the rose-coloured icing on the cakes. And right there in the readings was a command that childless women should rejoice:

Galatians 4:27 Scriptum est enim laetare sterilis quae non paris erumpe et exclama quae non parturis quia multi filii desertae magis quam eius quae habet virum. (For it is written: "Be glad, O barren woman, who bears no children; break forth and cry aloud, you who have no labor pains; because more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband.")

Well, I have a husband, and this all probably applies more to nuns, and St. Paul probably meant it figuratively anyway, but I'll take it!

At lunch a young Polish guest, in Edinburgh just for the weekend, surveyed the rest of the dozen people around the pink tablecloth and remarked that none of us had children. And, indeed, I can see that this would look strange to Polish eyes, for Poland is a country that really loves children, and most Polish adults prefer to have them. We were of all ages ranging from 25 to 69.

I explained that everyone except BA and I were unmarried and BA and I had married too late for children. And I went on at great length about my parish friend currently away in Asia, who is married and had two children while attending our EF Mass. This was in part to prove that some people in our EF community actually do have babies. (And there are others, of course.) But I had to admit that this friend never comes to Sunday Lunch, and indeed socially the community is roughly divided between those who have children and those who don't. However, this is partly because families with children don't really have the time or the inclination to come to Sunday Lunch.

Here is where I should write something clever and poignant about the message of the Gospel being partly about the inclusion of those left without children or husbands or family ties into society, but poppets I am wiped. Lunch for 14 means a lot of work, and BA always snores after parties.

St. Edith Stein's Advice for Single Girls

Here's an excellent article about the advice of St. Edith Stein (Teresa Benedicta of the Cross) for Single women. St. Edith (or Teresa) was an adult Single long before she entered Carmel, for reasons beyond her control.

Thank you very much to one of our Readers named Jennifer!

American Singles' Thanksgiving Survival Game

Let us turn our eyes to our American sisters, for [NEXT] Thursday is their Thanksgiving Day, and many of them will find themselves deep in the bosom of their extended family being asked if they have found a "special fella" yet.

From my uncle's death until my nephew Pirate was a few months old, my family was entirely blue- and green-eyed, and we used to play this terrible game called "Everyone Stare at the Brown-Eyed Person." Perhaps in some subconscious attempt to add genetic variety to our family, my brothers and I dated people with dominant genes and actually brought them home for supper. (My sisters were understandably cagey about exposing their dates to our family.) The effect of having five pairs of blue eyes and two pairs of green boring into them must have been pretty awful for our dominant-gened guests. Deary me. You could have made it into a story about the Nazi occupation of France for children.

Gestapo: Tell us the location of the Resistance, or ve vill stare at you.

Brown-eyed Frenchman: Non! I weel nevair tell you. Nevair.

Gestapo: Ve vill see about that! Gentlemen, prepare to stare!

Frenchman: Non! Non! Not that blindeenng blue Teutoneek glare! Aaaah!

Single people attest that the same thing happens to them on such jolly family occasions as American Thanksgiving. Wonderful Aunt Tilly, who has been smiling sympathetically at her niece ever since she arrived, finally leans across the sweet potatoes with marshmallow dish and says, just as there is a lull in the conversation:

"So, dear. Find anyone SPECIAL yet?"

And then everyone at the table, including her 20 year old married cousin and cousin-in-law, stares at the poor Single until someone kind clears their throat and says, "Time enough for that!"

Then Aunt Tilly says "Yes, indeed," and the most dysfunctional person present says, "Don't leave it too long, though! After all, tick tick tick!"

Oh the horror! And this is a NICE family, where everyone gets along and nobody gets off their heads drunk and has fistfights on the front lawn. (I shall discuss the dilemma of dysfunction tomorrow.)

To help American Singles get through Thanksgiving, I long ago devised a wonderful GAME. It's an easy game. In short, American readers count how many times their relations allude to their Single status and then report their tally here on Black Friday. Obviously this game depends on the honour system. To make it extra fun this year, you have to pledge to join the American Singles' Thanksgiving Survival Game on the poll in the margin. And on Black Friday*, I want a full report in the combox. The game begins as soon as you wake up on Thanksgiving morning and ends when you retire to your bedroom that night.

Incidentally, in the little anecdote above, the Single gets TWO points: one for Aunt Tilly, and one for Mr Tick Tick Tick.

This is our traditional game. Those who want to add a new game, might be interested in the Orthogals' Single Bingo board. Simply print out the bingo board and hide it under the bathroom sink, and whenever a relation says one of the clichés give yourself a point for the bingo AND for the Singles' Thanksgiving Survival game. When you get a chance, mark the bingo board. If you can figure out how to do it, photograph your Singles' bingo board and send it to me by email on Black Friday. Then I will announce who has won Singles' Bingo.

The beauty of the games, of course, is that they turn your relatives' conversational crimes into delicious and delightful points. In past years, sisters have actually competed with each other for the most points, although naturally this competition is entirely passive, like playing the lottery. I bet one could get the edge over another by wearing grey or 1980s-style glasses or anything that might goad Aunt Tilly into saying "You'll never get a fella if you dress like that." However, I am ruling that if this is done deliberately, it is cheating.

*Black Friday, the day after the third Thursday in November (i.e. American Thanksgiving) is the day Americans begin their Christmas shopping in earnest, and so the businesses "in the red" finally turn a profit and are, therefore, "in the black." I encourage readers to post their results first thing in the morning of Black Friday, because I'm on Greenwich Mean Time and will be dead asleep before y'all come home with your loot.

Book News: Great new reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, for which I thank the reviewers from my heart. Don't forget that although women buy most of the novels, men like thrillers, so my novel makes a good present for men and women alike! I hasten to say that Ceremony of Innocence is not for children, as it has grown-up themes, scary scenes and enough irony to build a battleship.

But to paraphrase Saint Francis of Assisi, let there be a 21st Century Catholic Literary Renaissance, and let it begin with ME. ;-)

First Book Update: Oh, and of course Seraphic Singles/The Closet's All Mine/Anielskie Single makes a great gift from one Single woman to another!

The Inherent Dignity of the Single State

I'll tell you what this blog isn't: it isn't a guide to getting a husband.

I wish I knew the secrets of husband-getting. Tomorrow I leave for Rome on holiday, and several million Euros would come in handy. I have some general ideas, but not a magic formula.

There is no magic formula. There is human nature, and there is Providence.

Human nature is very much influenced by society. Human beings are by our very nature conformist, and we tend to conform to society around us. In societies that champion premarital chastity, it is easier to stay chaste. In societies that champion early marriage, it is easier to get married. (It is, however, less easy not to be married.)

Catholic women are caught between a rock and a hard place. In the West, society champions premarital sex, and it strongly discourages early marriage.  But Catholicism forbids premarital sex, and it holds up vowed life--as a married person, a priest or a religious--as the ideal.

This means the Catholic woman who wishes to remain chaste and to marry without being "test-driven"  is going to be, in the West, a nonconformist, and men most likely not to be annoyed or unsettled by her failure to conform are going to be other nonconformists. And let me tell you about nonconformists: we can be weird. If we're nonconformists about sex, we can be nonconformists about religion, and if we are nonconformists about religion--I speak as someone who goes primarily to the Traditional Latin Mass--we might be nonconformists about clothing and opinions and social behaviour. Gleefully so. It's hard to find someone who refuses to conform to society's sexual expectations and yet is otherwise entirely "normal."

Incidentally, anyone who wears a Che Guevera T-shirt on a Western university campus is a total conformist. One of the most hilarious things about conformists is how conformist they are when they think they are being edgy. No doubt Miley Cyrus thought she was being edgy last week. In fact, Miley was just going along with the zeitgeist. I've seen similar behaviour in clubs.

The best hope for Catholics then, particularly the vast majority who are natural conformists--which is not shameful in itself, incidentally, as it shows a natural and even enviable openness to community--would be to withdraw from contemporary Western society and create a Catholic-only nation were it not for one thing: Providence.

Before Providence where scientific or social scientific (very dodgy) determinism falls down flat on its face. Atheists can stare at contradictory material data all day long and make pronouncements about how short men have little hope of marriage, and women over 35 can hope only for low-earning 50 year old suitors and how bumblebees can't fly. Catholics don't have the luxury of being so stupid.

Poor old atheists have missed out on the most important Reality of reality which is the existence of a Supreme Being Whose personality and love for us was revealed in and by Jesus of Nazareth. Catholics have not. And therefore, Catholics know Providence means more than the scribblings of sociology. Short men often marry. Thirty-something women occasionally marry high-earning twenty-something men. Bumblebees do fly. Chaste Catholic girls usually do marry.

The fact is that God has a plan for everyone's life, and everyone could figure it out much more easily if we would trust in God, listen for His voice and see where He is in our lives around us right now. God is not just "up there"; He is "down here" and among us. He has revealed His will through the Scriptures and Tradition, and by paying attention to the Scriptures and Tradition, in the way a blind person pays attention to her cane and her dog, we can find our way in the dark.

Yes, there are qualities that are attractive to other human beings--big eyes, shiny hair, a roguish grin and whatnot. The best ones I know are joy and confidence. And the deepest joy and confidence come from joy and confidence in God. And Catholic Single women living chaste (and therefore perhaps uncomfortably un-conformist) lives are a testament to obedience to God; what is needed for flourishing is also joy and confidence in Him.

The Single state, lived in a spirit of chastity, even if it should turn out to be temporary, is inherently dignified because it points to a sustained openness to and trust in the will of God, in Providence. It puts God's will above all else, particularly the Western god of Sex (for whom g*y m*rriage activists are currently the high priests). Sex is only God's servant; godhood sits ill upon it. The chaste Single person gives glory to God by not allowing the servant to usurp God's will for her.

And so the point of this blog is not to get you all married off, although you do seem to get married quite often--long-time reader Med School Girl is the most recently engaged--which does not particularly surprise me, as most people marry eventually. The point of this blog is to show you your inherent dignity as Singles and to encourage you in joy and trust in God.

With that, I am off to pack for Rome. I shall return a week Monday, D.v.  God bless you!

Auntie Seraphic & Need Pep Talk

Birthday/Girls' Night. Had sudden flu. Went to Goth club anyway. 

Dear Auntie,

I've written you a couple times before and have always loved your advice. And I love your blog! I was wondering, if you need a topic idea, could you post a pep talk of sorts for the searching singles? Not so much a don't list, but a you're doing okay list? And not so much a "watch out for this type of guy" thing as a "it's not your fault you're pursued by weirdos" thing (two of my roommates have been bombarded with really weird men pursuing them, to the extent that these fellows have made more than a few events awkward and unpleasant). 

All the single women I know (and there seem to be so many of us) are struggling right now: there aren't any weddings, or engagements, or boyfriends. The pool of NCB is limited to just CB, completely missing the N part, and it's really starting to get old. Okay, to be entirely fair, there are a few NCB's here and there, they're just not interested in us, or they have recently announced plans to enter the seminary. To top everything off, it seems like every sermon this entire summer was about being faithful to your spouse, raising children, etc. Nothing for the spinster Aunts! 

We're trying to to keep on trucking, work, be happy and enjoy the privileges of being single (and there are so many! don't get me wrong!), but there isn't much caffeine in our lives and there is a feeling of lethargy in the air. 

Thanks for everything you do!

Need Pep Talk

Dear Need Pep Talk,

You don't mention how old you are, but my usual recommendation for the under-30 set is to scamper straight to the mirror and admire your beautiful under-30 skin. Say, "I love you, beautiful under-30 skin, and I promise to protect you from the wicked sun with hats and sun screen!"

Possibly this is shallow, but I don't care. You 20-somethings have beautifully fresh faces; enjoy them while you have them and preserve them for the future. 

Meanwhile, if there are no men on the scene, you and your friends are in a Golden Era of Singleness upon which you will look back fondly, and one day you will all desperately try to figure out some day you ALL can meet up, even for two hours, or just dream that this could ever have been a possibility. 

This spring, for example, there was a Mostly Married Lady Miracle when five of my old crowd, nicknamed, "Les Girls", managed to meet in a Toronto restaurant, all together for the first time since E's wedding. 

K had recently flown in from the West Coast, bound for a conference. E drove down from the city limits. L couldn't quite get away from it all, so she brought the baby. Half-Pint was... Actually Half-Pint is still only 22 or something and currently still Single, so it wasn't that hard for her. And I was visiting from Scotland. For the first ten minutes, we barely spoke. We just sat looking at each other, grinning foolishly. We were all together!

We spent all our time catching up and eating, so we didn't have an opportunity for "Remember Whens?" But had we the whole night to chat, we would have definitely got to the "Remember Whens." And there is a lot to remember from those days when we sprawled around the "Les Girls" house, moaning "Why are we still Single? Aaaaaaaah!"

There was, for example, the time we went clubbing with the sweet Muslim housemates, who refused to leave us when we got drunk, even though they were somewhat disgusted that we were drunk. And then there was the time E and L planned this amazing Goth Birthday Party for me, and I came down with flu in the middle of it, but made myself sick so my stomach would stop hurting and we could go to the club anyway. And then there was the time E and I went to Montreal with silly old Der Guter (see book), and Der Guter told my brother he was going to marry me. And there was the time.... You see where I'm going with this.

You Single Time is your Single Girl time, and by enjoying it together, you are laying up wonderful memories for the future. The future is there, fixed in the mind of God. You're travelling towards it, and although things you do today help determine it, God already has a Plan for you. So although naturally you are worried about what this Plan may be, or when you're going to see the Truly Life-Changing part of it, make sure you take a break from worry to simply have the fun of being girls together.

Because, you know, that is what I loved best about Single life. It wasn't the travelling--I travel more now! It was just being with the other Single Girls. And our caffeine came from the parties we threw--even if half the boys there were male religious--and from rushing off to clubs in the freezing dark--and from baking muffins and impromptu pyjama parties and checking out sales and discussing our studies. And now, as I sit in my attic in Scotland, I think back on those days, and I am so glad that I had fellow Catholic Single girls to share them with.  

Meanwhile, the absolute best book I ever came across about Single Life is called "Live Alone and Like It" by Marjorie Hillis. It was first published in 1936, so it assumes you're either going to live a chaste life or to have to pretend you are, and it also assumes, as I do, that most Singles are going to eventually marry, so you must seize the opportunities being Single gives you. It has a wonderful tone, so if you need an extra lift, do get this marvellous book

I hope this is helpful!

Grace and peace,

Seraphic

P.S. You're not really responsible for what goes on in the heads of the weirdos. You can, however, head the weirdos off at the pass with firm "No's" as soon as they appear. I don't know what you mean by weirdos, so let us just call them "eccentric or socially awkward men whose advances you wish to reject." A kind but firm "No" in time saves nine. Speak to them loudly and offer them unsolicited advice, like a mother or schoolteacher, nun or aged aunt. 

   

Honouring Your Identity 2: Single/Wolna/Célibataire

"You can't wear that dress!" shouted my sister as I packed for our brother's wedding, now five years ago. "You'll look like a spinster aunt!"

"I AM a spinster aunt," I replied, but I don't remember if I wore the spinster aunt dress. What I do remember is that two years of blogging about my life as a Single Catholic made it easy for me to be proud to be a spinster aunt.

Besides, I wasn't legally a spinster aunt. Legally I was a divorced aunt, which from a Catholic point of view is much more depressing. Fortunately for my peace of mind, my annulment papers made me spiritually a spinster again. Not a virgin again, obviously, but still a spinster, free to be the me I was supposed to be.

It turns out I was not supposed to be a spinster aunt for very much longer. And the moral of the story, leetle gairls, is that if you flee from a bad marriage and it is quite obviously over and very probably was never sacramental and you have no children whose feelings you have to take time to consider, apply for the annulment as soon as the ink is dry on your divorce certificate. Don't wait until Mr Right turns up. Get the annulment ASAP and return to being a Catholic spinster, so that if Mr Right or Right Convent of St. Right in Rightsville breaks into your life, you will be ready to say "Yes."

In Canada it takes a year's separation to divorce and at least a year after that to get the annulment, if applicable, so that is two years for you to wait out Divorced Person's Insanity. Divorcing young Catholics should be locked away in a convent or monastery for at least a year, but very possibly two, for their own good. It is just so awful. It is so awful the primary purpose of this blog is to make you feel so happy and hopeful as Singles you do not just march into a bad marriage hoping everything will work out just 'cause. In short, I don't want you getting divorced and going off the rails.

I hate divorce even though I am grateful to divorce because it made me free, which reminds me that the proper word for "Single" in Polish is not "Single" (pronounced "SEEN-gluh"), which is sort of an insult, like "hipster" ("HEEP-stair"), but wolny for a man and wolna for a woman. And this is a much better word than Single because it is the same word for FREE.

"Jestem wolna" means "I am Single" or "I am free" and it points to the beautiful heart of Singleness which is that it makes you free for marriage, or for religious life, or for life in a L'Arche community, or as a numerary in Opus Dei, or for any commitment to which God calls you, in His own good time, through the medium of history.

We can only read the history of our lives backwards, so I see in my own life that God inspired me to start my Singles blog, which made me happier to be Single, which came through in my blog, which attracted B.A.'s friends, who alerted B.A., who read my blog and, when I wrote about coming to the U.K., invited me to visit. Hey presto. God working in history, both the history of communications technology and the history of little me, to show me my true state-in-life vocation at the age of 38. And because I had got my annulment almost ten years before, I was wolna, free, to say yes at once.

Incidentally, my writing in the Catholic Register inspired a lovely group of nuns in British Columbia to write to me personally suggesting I try my vocation with them.  Isn't that sweet? At the time it made me a bit cranky, though, as when deep down you really want to get married, religious life really seems second best and just not something you want to embrace. This makes you feel bad, of course, since religious life is the highest form of life, so what is wrong with you for not wanting it? Are you a bad Catholic, etc., etc? No, not necessarily. You probably just do not have a call to religious life.

Therefore I think it's not just the events of history but what God writes on your heart that you must read to understand what God wants you to do, and I apologize to the Vocations Director of the IBVM in Toronto for wasting an afternoon of her time. Oh, and to the VD of the Tennesee Dominicans for wasting some of her time although in her case I am not really sorry because I love to tell people that the Tennessee Dominicans turned me down sight unseen. Hee hee!

Where was I? Oh! The French also have a better word for Single identity, for it is célibataire.

Now, we English-speakers often use the word "celibate" to mean we don't have sex. This is not the proper use of the word "celibate", which in English means what it does in French--an unmarried person, like a priest. However, there is something in the word that makes us think of not-having-sex, so this is also positive, from a Christian point of view.

Why? Because to not-have-sex when you are Single means that you are not a slave to sex, at the mercy of all that sex can throw at you without the safety of marriage. Sex is a fine servant but a really cruel and nasty master, and if you doubt me ask anyone who is addicted, actually addicted, to internet porn. Ask the poor young woman now known as "Slane Girl", or read the British papers about the children of women who let new lovers into the house as if with a revolving door.

"Single" is a problematic word because it suggests that you are alone. However, you are not alone. You are a free and (I hope) celibate woman with a family, friends, community and, most of all, loving Saviour.  And you have nothing to be ashamed about. As a single person, you have the freedom to be there for your family, friends, community and loving Saviour in a way a married woman can't. For example, I could not be at my nephew's birthday dinner in mid-August because I am married and living abroad. Were I still his spinster aunt, I would have been there. And it hurts me a little that I was not there, and even more that I couldn't get it together to get to the post office on time, etc.  However, I have to put my husband and our Old Worldy stuff first, just as St. Paul thought so problematic.

So if someone asks if you are Single or, worse, "still Single", you may say "yes" happily and hopefully instead of feeling terrible. You are not alone but wolna to God's call, whatever it is, and to take care of your family and friends in a way you might not be able to later, and--I hope and pray--you are célibataire in the chaste way that keeps you safe.

Update: I have been wondering whether to write about poor Slane Girl at all, but the one saving grace in the whole awful story is that she isn't known by her name (and please don't look for it, poppets) but simply as "Slane Girl." This should make it easier for her to get on with her life. Meanwhile, thanks for nothing, Sexual Revolution. Now it's got Ireland, with a spandy new permissive abortion law and everything. Is Poland next? I seriously hope not--and there is hope for although Poland has allowed abortion since Communist days, there are comparatively few abortions in Poland. (Still, have some more children, ludzie.)

Okay, I wrote about Poland again. I just really love Poland. Yes, I know it's not Catholic Disneyland. But it is so much more Catholic than here. Have I mentioned how well the Poles take care of the graves of their dead...? And what Poles do instead of celebrating Hallowe'en....? I don't care how annoying Babcia is, she's right: Poland is almost like heaven compared to wherever she is now--only with, ahem, a lot of car thieves. Married car thieves who use contraceptives. Bad! (I don't care about the cars.)

Single Friends and Stability

I answered an email today that made me think about friendships. I have a number of friends who are Single and probably always will be Single. And this means they have a lot of time for their friends, and their friends--particularly the Single or childless ones--have a lot of time for them.

Singles often worry about not being a priority in other people's lives--although presumably they rank somewhere in the affections of their family members--but I can tell you that my Single friends are top priority with me. (Well, top after B.A.) This is probably because I don't have children, but even if I did have children, I would certainly want adult friends to talk to after a long day or week of shrieking and baby talk.

The North American reluctance to have friends much younger or much older than oneself strikes me as foolish and shortsighted. I did not realize now normative it was for me until I spent a summer in Germany and discovered that 20 year old boys were happy to hang out with 30-something me. I was happy but troubled enough to talk it over with a fellow foreign student, a priest, and he told me that's how Europeans are. And how awesome is that?

B.A. and I recently had two Canadian Trid girls to stay, and they were astonished that our set acted as if we were all the same age. That said, we were all of us over 23. It's not like there were any children around, or teenagers who should not have been downing the Tesco plonk we guzzle by the bottle or listening to our endless thoughts on the O'Brien scandal.

What gives the multi-generational set stability are the Elders, as we over-39s have been for convenience called. We Elders have deep, deep roots in the community, and although we go on holiday, we come back to our homes.  The younger members, especially the foreign students, leave Edinburgh on holiday or permanently, but they eventually come back, if only for a visit. Foreign students who return to their old haunts (e.g. Toronto) sometimes discover that everything has changed and their old friends have dispersed and moved on, or have no time for them. This isn't likely to happen with us Elders, for we are old and stable. Our sentimental young can fly free confident in the knowledge that as long as the Elders live, we will be up for a drink and a chat.

As a thirty-something Single, I found myself with a lot of twenty-something Single friends. I put this down to the fact that I was were twenty-something Singles are, i.e. grad school, and that we had the same lifestyle: Catholic, no kids, feverishly studying, longing to party, wondering where The One was. But, of course, I expected and hoped my twenty-something friends would get married because that's what they wanted to do. My surprise when I got engaged (age 37) before some of them did! And then I ran off to the UK. How very unstable and unreliable of me. Fortunately, I had a reputation for mad pranks and surprising behaviour. My friend Lily's summation of B.A. was, "I'm so thankful. I was worried he'd be too normal."

But now I am definitely old and stable and set in my ways, and even if I did have a baby, the walls of the Historical House are super-thick, so he or she could wail away comfortably in his or her room while the rest of us guzzled Tesco plonk in the dining-room.

What I am saying here is that if you are a twenty-five year old Single, of course most of your friends are going to get married and go. And therefore you must not put all your friendship eggs in the youth basket. You should go out of your way to be friendly to interesting and interested older married couples whose children have flown the nest, or to middle-aged couples who haven't had children, or to older Singles who love being Single but are also sociable. It is especially helpful, I think, to make friends with Catholic Singles who honestly enjoy their Catholic Single way of life and live it to the hilt.

You can also set down roots yourself as you grow older, and become a sort of bird house for younger Singles to visit occasionally as they flit about in their unstable, adventurous, youthful way. I adore the younger members of my set, but I am rooted in reality and realize that they have a lot of flitting to do before they settle down, and they are very likely to settle somewhere else. This is not as painful for me (age 39++) as it might be for you, not only because I have B.A. (a very big because), but because I know I have older friends who simply aren't going anywhere. Well, the grave, I suppose, but there's no need to worry about that quite yet.

The Bedsit

Once upon a time I lived in a big room on the second floor (first floor we would say in Europe) of a very big early 20th century house that had been turned into flats. My landlady sold mutual funds; keenly interested in never having to be economically independent on anyone else ever again, I routinely bought mutual funds. I was rather susceptible to sales pitches as I had just done the unthinkable and run away from my then-husband. My landlady was a shark.

The big room came with a chest of drawers/cabinet. I soon added a futon that served as a sofa by day and as a couch by night. There must have been a table, for I remember sitting up at night before the big bay window conjugating verbs. My work ethic was admirable: I reviewed three years of high school Italian, first year university Latin, even first year Greek. I had neither a television nor a computer.

I also got up early every morning and went to the gym. Then I went to work. Then I went home to have supper before going down, three nights a week, to the boxing club. It was open only three nights a week. If it had been open five or six nights a week, I probably would have gone five or six nights a week.

On Sundays I went to Mass. I could go to Mass at only one church--the church of the priest who had said "Honey, get out when you're young"--without feeling like I wanted to kill somebody afterwards. The closest evening Mass was in a low-ceilinged church of astonishing, possibly architectural prize-winning, modernist ugliness and the entire congregation seemed grey, exhausted, and only going through the motions. This was the one period of my life when I sometimes skipped going to Sunday Mass. My justification was there was no point going to Mass if it made me that angry.

In hindsight, evening Mass--so quiet, so dull, so lacking in the great choir and the shining personality of the pastor uptown--was the one place where anger could catch up with me. It was like my very first Christian yoga class in Boston. It was not until I took that class that I realized that there was something  wrong with my foot, and that it was absolutely killing me. I hobbled away and waited for hours and hours in the college clinic (so much for snappy American private health care) to discover I had very slightly fractured it weeks before.

It amazes me that I could not have gotten rid of all that anger just through all the work I was doing. I mean, I was always working. Exercise, detailed-oriented job, exercise, verb conjugation. I ate only 1300 to 1500  low-fat calories a day: I diligently added them all up. (An apple has 90-110 calories!)  No wonder my family began to mutter words like "gaunt" when I came to visit. It amazes me that I didn't simply burn up the anger when I ran out of calories.

Boxing is a traditional Catholic cure for frustration (especially sexual) and anger. It seem like Irish-named priests in the early 20th century were always founding boxing clubs, were always sending boys to square off in the ring. Since I was in a boxing gym for up to nine hours a week, you would have thought my bruises and occasional swollen nose hid the tranquility of a nun, but no. Maybe boxing works like that for guys. (If I had a son, I would encourage him to try it.) It certainly staves off boredom. For adrenaline, there's nothing like getting into the ring and facing another violent member of homo sapiens sapiens for purposes of violence.  But it did not get rid of my anger, the anger of which I was barely conscious. Mostly I thought I was lonely.

The bedsit was heaven compared to what I had left, but some nights the walls just closed in. And this brings me back to the night I was thinking about this morning: the night I went to a dance club by myself.

There are a lot of things you might not want to do by yourself, but are perfectly doable. You can eat in a restaurant by yourself; nobody but the servers will notice. You can go to the cinema by yourself. You can even go on holiday by yourself. But I do not recommend that you leave your bedsit (bachelor apartment) late at night, walk past blocks of empty parking lots in a depressed area of town, go to a noisy dance club where you know no-one, knock back alcopop until you are drunk and then walk back past the empty parking lots at 1 AM. Although nothing bad happened to me, that was a stupid and irresponsible thing for a woman to do. At the time I thought I had been pushed out of the flat by loneliness, but it was probably not wanting to be stuck there with my anger.

I don't remember if this was before or after I finally picked up the phone and called a psychotherapist--a Catholic psychotherapist, one who advertised at the back of my comforting church. But it was in therapy that I was forced to sit still with my anger and at last begin the long task of loosening its hitherto anonymous hold on my life.

"But Marmee," says Jo in Little Women, "you are never angry."

"I am angry almost every day of my life," says Jo's saintly mother, and as a child I thought how wonderful she was to experience daily rage and yet be such a joy to be around. But what Alcott didn't mention, and what I don't want to forget, is what a blessing anger can be.

Sure, anger drove me out into the dangerous night because I couldn't stand to be alone with it. But it also propelled me into good physical health-- when I was 29 the examining nurse told me I had the heart of a 14 year old. It drove me into boxing, an experience I would not have given up for anything. It helped me to reclaim Italian and Latin and to come to grips with that bugaboo of first year uni, Greek. It thus prepared me for three years of solid academic work. Above all, it got me out of a bad marriage sooner rather than later.

So I conclude this morning that there is nothing wrong with anger in itself. (It is certainly superior to depression.) The moral questions are What should you do with it? and How do you make anger your servant, not your master?

Update: Prudence, not anger, drove me back to my computer to mention that your former boxing career is not usually something you want to mention on a first date with an NCB. Believe me on this. Few good and licit things undercut your careful projection of Devout 21st Century Catholic Femininity than your past or present ability to beat the stuffing out of somebody. Meanwhile, the Not Nice Not Catholic Not Really Anything Rats love it because they think this might mean you are kinky.  Again, believe me on this one; don't find out the hard way. Revelations of martial arts prowess should really be left for later.

How Singles Can Annoy Married People

Note to New Readers: I have written for Single people, in a Single-positive way, for six years, at least six days a week. This is the only post I have ever written in all that time that describes why married people occasionally get fed up with their Single friends. Many Single people have complained to me that they feel abandoned by married friends. Whereas the number one reason why they don't see their married friends so much any more is that with marriage comes responsibilities, work, and a husband who often wants his wife to stay home and keep him company, there are indeed a few things that bug some married people about some of their single friends and acquaintances and even just single strangers.

I am posting this explanation because I am tired of complete strangers telling me I hate Singles.

I will have to breathe in and out for a bit to get my composure. I made the mistake of entering into a Facebook conversation about Singledom.

There was a complaint that the Church does "nothing" for Single people, which is what I was going to write about, but then I caught a remark directed at me that contradicted my feelings of being alone on New Year's Eve.

I had volunteered that my husband and I were alone on New Year's Eve because most of our friends were at a party for Singles, and how great it was that Singles could take matters in their own hands and plan events for themselves. The divorced person pointed out that I was not really alone, as I was with I was my husband. ":-)"

I saw red.

One should never write anything when seeing red, so I clicked away from Facebook.

I will not go into the reasons (yet) I saw red, or a defense of my feelings of loneliness on New Year's Eve, which actually had nothing to do with the Singles' party and something to do with being 5,338 kilometers from home and family. Instead I will try to write something constructive.

I have been writing for Singles for at least six years, and I was Single from birth until 25 and then (arguably) from the age of 26 to 38, although the annulment didn't come through until I was 28. So that's at least ten years of dithering What-Is-My-Vocation? and Where-Is-He? Single Life, plus much correspondence with Single people. And, admittedly unusually, most of my social circle in Edinburgh is composed of Single people. I want you to keep that in mind when you read my following remarks.

One of the biggest complaints of Singles that I come across is that they are left out of social events hosted by Married Friends. I imagine this is true of some Married Friends, including B.A. and me, although we have no policy of shunning Single friends. Our resources are limited, so we invite some friends some times, and others other times. We invite Singles alone or with other Singles or with Married people, or entertain just one or two Married couples, and we don't think marital status is much of a guest list issue. (I might briefly ponder the kindness of a guest being the ONLY Single there, and the danger of being suspected of setting up the ONLY female Single guest with the ONLY male Single guest.)

B.A. and I entertain unusually often for Married People, and here is something Singles often don't get: Married People don't usually have much time or inclination for non-family parties.(Married men are notoriously wedded to sofa and TV.)

This is particularly true if they have children. Children are often so embarrassing and their behaviour so non-adult, that it seems to their parents a kindness to inflict them only on their relations, who love them, and on other adults with children, who are guaranteed to understand/be immune.

Also, the Married State is so different from the Single State that Married People often find a relief in the company of Married People we do not find among Singles. There is just so much that can be explained without words.

And then some Single people (not all, obviously, since my own Single friends tend not to do this) annoy Married People by constantly talking about being Single, and how sad it is to be Single, and how much better it is to be Married, and how lucky the Married friend is.

Some Married People (like me) do not mind talking to Single People about their Single state. Others can't stand it.

Some Married People, perceiving the Singleness as a problem to be solved, offer thoughtful spouse-hunting advice, which the Single tearfully rejects. Some Married People, thinking one should look on the Bright Side of Single Life, suggest ways in which other Singles have found happiness, which the Single tearfully rejects.

Some Married People invite a Single woman and a Single man to the same parties, thinking these Singles will be pleased, only to be berated later. Some Married People avoid matchmaking entirely, only to be berated eventually.

With some Singles, some Married People think they just can't win.

In short, it's not necessarily because a Single is Single that she or he isn't invited to parties.

One of the things about being Married is that you see Single life from the other side, and can report back to Single friends about what useful information you can now see. So here is what I've learned:

Here are ways to annoy a Married Person:

1. Deny or belittle her experiences or feelings, particularly with the remark "Well, at least you have a husband."

Married Woman: I miss my family so much.
Unusually Clueless Single: Well, at least you have a husband.

Married Woman: Actually I was in hospital. Miscarriage.
Unusually Clueless Single: I'm sorry. Well, at least you have a husband.

Married Woman: Paid work, housework. Paid work, housework. Paid work, housework. Visit parents. Visit in-laws. It never ends, and I never have time to myself, and sometimes I wish I could just run away to Paris for a weekend.
Unusually Clueless Single: Well, at least you have a husband.

2. Tell a Married Person what marriage is supposed to be like (beyond non-abusive).

Unusually Clueless Single: Sex isn't really that important to a marriage, is it?

Unusually Clueless Single: The work of marriage should be 50-50!

Unusually Clueless Single: The most important thing is that sex be romantic!

Unusually Clueless Single: NFP is just so easy! Why would anyone ever be tempted to use anything else?

3. Upbraid a Married Person for noticing that some of the 3.5 billion men she is not married to are attractive. Trowel on the shame. Go on. She deserves it.

Married Woman: Ah, that new usher is certainly a charmer!

Unusually Clueless Single: I'm really shocked to hear you say that. You, a married woman!

4. Upbraid or gossip about a Married Person for inviting you to a party in which you were the only Single, or the only Single your age, or one of two Singles, the other being male.

5. Upbraid or gossip about a Married Person for not inviting you to a party in which you would have been the only Single, or the only Single your age, or one of two Singles, the other being a male who could have been the One.


In general, people like people who are happy, upbeat, don't complain much and don't take swipes at them for their way of life. And most of my Single friends are like that, which is one reason why I have so many Single friends.

Don't worry. I will soon write another post on ways in which Married People Can Annoy Singles, although readers will be much more up-to-date on that than I!

Sin, Actually

Grace. One of the teachings of my Canadian theology school that resounds through my brain ten years later is "If you begin with sin, you end with sin. If you begin with Grace, you end with Grace." I think this is particularly true in all discussions of sexuality. Otherwise we end sounding like Euripides' Phaedra ("Only death can blot out the shame of my random crush!") and Hippolytus ("Why can't we just buy sons?") I think Catholic artists, in particular, have a duty to somehow illustrate the great beauty of Eros, which is above everything else an impulse to escape the prison of one's own ego to connect with someone or something else.

Of course, we live in a post-Fall universe, so sexuality has been at least slightly messed up along with every other created thing, and we have to pray and strive lest the wellsprings of Eros get clogged up with selfishness, greed, lust to dominate, fear and even hatred. And the terrific challenge to Christians, particularly artists, is that we have to school our very thoughts. But whoever thinks that this is just too hard should contemplate the clerical abuse scandals to see where "Oh, don't worry about such little things" has got us. Deliberately sustained thoughts very often lead to deliberate actions.

I was thinking all this the other day when a colleague put up this article on Facebook. It is from the Globe and Mail, an old Anglo-Canadian newspaper whose long legacy of anti-Catholic sneers once actually made me cry, quite hysterically, in the toilets at work. (When I called my mother for comfort, she said, "It's the Globe and Mail. What do you expect?")

The article, as you can see, describes the Toronto Newman Centre as if it were a cult. It "openly targets" university students, says the Globe and Mail article provocatively. Jeepers. I'd love to see if they could get away with saying Hillel "openly targets" university students. And of course the article insinuates that Courage is some sort of scary, scary group that forces its members to "resist homosexuality."

What Courage actually does is acknowledge that there are gay Catholics who have particular challenges in remaining chaste and thus want and need special pastoral care. The Newman, incidentally, also offers pastoral care to other Catholics who want to remain chaste, e.g. in the confessional. To which I am not a stranger.

When shaking its finger at Catholics' supposed reluctance to get with the equality program, the world conveniently ignores that our high sexual ideal is for everybody. Married people do not get a free pass. I imagine many married people have a polygamous/polyandrous orientation, and yet we suppress that all the time--even more than Single Catholics who go around snogging now this girl and that. If a Single parishioner in my parish casually and drunkenly snogged somebody at a party, my guess is that his or her confessor would go relatively easy on him or her. But if I or B.A. did that, our confessor would rip our heads off. (N.B. I'm not complaining. I'm just telling it like it is.)

Then there's the whole NFP deal, such a trial to young married Catholics who are really afraid of having large families but really do not want to be closed to life either.

Then there's the whole transmission-of-life deal, such a trial to old married Catholics who seek fertility help from specialists and embarrassingly and demeaningly have to spell out to strangers why we cannot do this or that.

But of course there are also the chastity challenges of the unmarried, both those who worry they will never get married and those who know that they will not. (And, yes, they are often, perhaps usually, maybe even almost always a tougher row to hoe.) One thing about chaste clerical celibacy and the chaste celibacy of nuns and monks: it puts even the non-gay majority in relatively the same position of gay Catholics who also want to remain chaste.

My dry remark to my colleague was that I remembered being urged at the Newman "to resist heterosexuality." The Newman discouraged heterosexuality in the same way Courage discourages homosexuality, and people should get their information about Courage from its members, not from the Globe and Mail.

Underneath our exchange, some wag wrote, "Resistance is futile."

I beg to differ, particularly when you have the assistance of Grace.

Worse Than Drowning?

This post involves "It's a Wonderful Life" plot spoilers.

Last night a party from the Historical House went across the fields to the nearest Fellow Historical House (14th c, mostly rebuilt early 17th c) and watched most of "It's a Wonderful Life" before sitting down to St. Stephen's/Boxing Day supper.

B.A. had never seen "It's a Wonderful Life," and I hadn't seen it for well over a decade. B.A., who admittedly was well-primed with wine, thought it absolutely fantastic. I was struck by how very often Providence frustrates the hero's plans and how Mary actively worked against them by countering George's wishes with her own wishes. By the way, I know it looked like it worked for Mary, but playing "Buffalo Gals" on the stereo four years after singing it with your crush object is kind of pathetic. Also pathetic is embroidering a cushion with the drunken rantings of your crush object and leaving it where he can see it.

What is not pathetic is being a middle-aged Single librarian in glasses. The most--perhaps the only--annoying part of "It's a Wonderful Life" is the lead up to the awful revelation of what George Bailey's non-existence would have meant. (PLOT SPOILERS AHEAD!)

We go from random acquaintances of George, to the moral health of the town of Bedford Falls, to his brother, to his wife and kids. There seems to be a progression: Nick is nasty, not nice; George's old boss did 20 years in the joint for murder; Bedford Falls is not a nice family town but Las Vegas, New York; Violet has gone professional; Harry drowned at nine, which meant a whole lot of American sailors died (although, as no-one ever mentions, this also meant a bunch of German pilots survived--Jawohl!); Ma Bailey is a lonely, crabbed old landlady, and as for Mary--!

Ah, Mary. Not only did Harry Bailey drown at the age of nine, but Mary became an Old Maid and a Librarian and Near-Sighted. How Mary would have become near-sighted in the absence of George is one consequence left unexplained.

Possibly I am being unfair. The real horror is not that Mary is an Old Maid--and, incidentally, she could have married Sam Wainwright, although I admit it would have taken all his gold to gild the pill of having to listen to him shout "Hee-haw" for the next 50 years--but that she doesn't recognize George. Even Mary does not know George. And if Mary doesn't know George, Mary doesn't love George, which is terrifically sad for George, who loves Mary to distraction. Let us focus on that, especially if we are Single, and very especially if we are Single Librarians.

Anyway, it is no longer 1946, and none of us live in Bedford Falls, a place from which, we must remember, George Bailey was always longing to escape. So watch "It's a Wonderful Life" without a pang, and don't forget to giggle at Mary's mysteriously unexplained glasses.

American Thanksgiving Singles Survival Game

It has crept up on me and surprised me at the last minute! Oh my little American Singles, it is the dreaded day of turkey doom, that day upon which you will be asked by random relations you see but once or twice a year the perfidious question: So, dear, do you have a boyfriend yet?

The rules of this game are very simple. You have to pay attention to all references to your long-term single state so that you can report them here. Obviously you are on your honour here, so no padding. Just counting.

And then reporting! Because the best part of the American Thanksgiving Singles Survival Game is telling us all in delicious detail what your Aunt said and then what your Uncle said, and then what your smart-aleck cousin said after that.

In past years readers have reported their own variations on this game, including in-house competitions between sisters.

The beauty of this game is that (like grace) it heals and elevates the stupid So, dear, do you have a boyfriend yet? questions and Don't worry, you'll be next remarks into POINTS! Feel free to bring a piece of paper and pencil to the table. Actually, put a pencil and paper in your pocket right now because sometimes relatives can't walk in the door without immediately saying "So, dear, do you have a boyfriend yet?"

SCENE: A charming family home in Rolling Prairie, Indiana, nestled between cornfields. Ceramic dwarves stand frozen on the lawn in mid-gambol.

The doorbell rings.

Mom: Dear, can you answer that?

You: Okay, Mom.

You open the door and behold on the doorstep Uncle Billy and Aunt Jean from Chicago.

You: Hi, Uncle Billy! Hi, Aunt Jean! Come on in.

Uncle Billy and Aunt Jean come on in.

Uncle Billy: How's my girl? (He seizes you in bear hug.)

You: Great! Ouch!

Aunt Jean: Now, Bill. Leave the girl alone. Let's look at you. My, my. How time does fly. (Her voice sinks.) We must have a proper chat in the kitchen. I want to talk to you.

Uncle Billy (loudly): Uh, oh. Girl stuff. No men allowed!

Aunt Jean: Now, Bill. Don't you start. (Her voice sinks again.) Honey, I read this column in Better Homes and Gardens about Single girls and it made me think of you. Hold on a minute, I'll get it from my purse.

You: I'll be back in a sec.

You rush to your room, seize a pencil and a piece of paper and write a big, thick /.


Mom (yelling up the stairs): Honey?! Why aren't you helping your uncle and aunt with their coats?

You: Coming!

Mom: I don't know what's gotten into that girl.

Aunt Jean: Well, apparently Single girls get a little funny during the holidays. It's the pressure of family expectations. I read about it in Better Home and Gardens.

You write another thick /, making your tally //. You feel a thrill of early victory. It's only three in the afternoon: depending on what's happening on the East Coast and Florida, you could be in the lead!

Uncle Bill: Don't be silly, Jean. There's nothing about that girl a good boyfriend wouldn't solve.

///

You: I'm coming! Sorry, Aunt Jean.

Aunt Jean: That's okay, dear. I'm all right and tight.

Uncle Bill: She's all right but not yet tight! Where's the punch? It's party time!

Aunt Jean: Oh, Bill. (She turns to you.) Now dear. Into the kitchen with you.

Uncle Bill: Uh oh. Here comes the grilling. Give only your name, rank and serial number!

Aunt Jean: Oh, Bill. Really, that man. You just wait till you're married, hon, and then you'll understand what we all have to put up with.

////

****

Let the games begin!

My New Flat

This is totally off-topic, but since a large number of you seemed to be interested in historical romances and houses, I thought I would tell you that for the next few weeks I will be dividing my time between a flat in an early seventeenth century house in the city and my usual flat in a late seventeenth century house (with eighteenth century improvements) in what is left of the most local countryside.

The city flat is very small and modern-looking, although it is at the very top of a very steep and narrow turning seventeenth century staircase and has views of other ancient buildings in Edinburgh's Old Town. Spires and towers and ball finials abound.

The flat has a tiny front hall, really an antechamber between door to stairwell and door to flat, a sitting-room, a bathroom, a kitchen, and a bedroom with two narrow single beds, somewhat like those of Bert and Ernie or married couples in old films.

The sitting-room has windows on both sides of the room, dressed with Jacobean rose-print drapes, a wine-coloured sofa and armchair, a modern tartan rug on the sisal carpet and a cunning electric fire in the nineteenth century tiled grate. It has a television with better reception than to that which we are accustomed, and there seems to be unlimited hot water, "Just like in Canada, darling."

Sadly, there is no coffee machine. And even more sadly, there is no internet access, so I will not be able to blog or read your comments. However, there is internet access at a nearby library, so I will not be out of touch.

Here is an article I came across about Other Singles of Good Will that I found very moving. It is in The New York Times, so read the combox at your peril. I quit when I got to the "imagine what a wonderful world it would be without religion" comment. Mmm, yes. Because 20th century experiments with that concept turned out SO WELL (sarcasm). So never mind the combox. There is enough in the article itself hinting at controversies within religious communities, shared by observant women of many religions.

Opportunities

Because I write for Singles, not because I harbour any desire to flee B.A., I sometimes ponder what I would be doing if I were still Single. The only image that comes up is of me in a big Catholic publishing house in Toronto, editing the Sunday missal. My imaginary office has a view of Lake Ontario, and there's a coffee machine in the kitchenette, and anyone who refers to the Holy Father as "Ratzinger" in my hearing is in big trouble.

I don't have an image of where I would be living, although I think I would still be living with my parents, because I like my parents and I don't like living alone. Every once in a blue moon I would get a personal letter from a religious order inviting me to "come and see" and I would wonder how they got my address.

That is where conjecture ends. I admit the idea of the publishing office gives me a pang because I would like the routine of 9-5, but of course only in a career I enjoyed, and I'm very grateful my mid-life immigration has not meant I have to scrub floors or work in a factory or do other work that well-educated immigrants often have to do, wherever they go.

(In case you're wondering why well-educated immigrants drive taxis, it is because it takes years to build up a network of contacts in your proper field, useful contacts who know where the jobs are, or want you to work for them.)

Anyway, the thing about marriage, as married ladies will often tell you just when you don't want to hear about it, is that it shuts a door on a lot of opportunities.

Of course nobody is supposed to fire female employees just for getting married anymore. But marriage often puts a roadblock in the careers of academics, for example, because if you marry a local man, with a local job, this often means you cannot seek a university position in any town but his. I am told there are fewer and fewer tenure-track positions available, and therefore the chances of finding one in your husband's town are slimmer than ever.

"Cry me a river," I heard someone say, a tiny voice from over the sea. "That's her choice, isn't it? I don't have a choice. I'd rather be married to my soul mate than go through all those horrible interviews at the MLA convention anyway."

Well, that may be very true. But that is also why, when you are Single, you should grasp all the opportunities that there are and that you can manage.

Incidentally, I should officially announce that B.A. said I could go to night school if I want to, and that I have signed up for Polish 1.1 (although I think I might have to upgrade to Polish 2.1) at Edinburgh University. For the sake of new readers I should explain that we have not been blessed with children, so I have much more freedom than mummies do.

So although there are all kinds of things I would like to do but can't, for various social, domestic or geographical reasons stemming from marriage (but the world well lost if lost for love), I can in fact go to night school.

Back to you. Right. Being Single can be a real pain, as you know, but it does have its bright side in adult life, and this is full autonomy and freedom to pursue work, hobbies, classes, travel and breakfast in bed on your day off without ever having to ask for permission. You can adopt a zoo of cats if you want to, for there is no man around to say no.

The statistics being what they are, the older you get, the more likely you are eventually to find yourself living with a man who says no to stuff. Of course, you might find yourself saying no to stuff to, as in "No, I don't think we should buy that object" and "No, you can't go down to the pub and wait out my tea party. You have to BE at my tea party." But the times your husband says no to your whims will be a real drag. So party now. PARTY NOW, POPPETS!!!

I have a word of caution about taking my advice and running with it, getting that amazing job in Phoenix, Arizona or going on a bus-tour of Europe or taking up belly-dancing classes or getting a grant to move to Prague and learn Czech. It is not to tweet or post up your movements on Facebook. If you do, you run the risk of the envious leaving comments like this:

"Oh you're so lucky. I don't even have time to go to the beauty parlour, now that the babies are here. LOL."

"Too fat from babies to go to belly-dance classes myself. LOL"

"Prague sounds wonderful but I guess I'll have to settle for being a yummy mummy. LOL."

And then you will find a comment on a favourite blog about how selfish single women are.

Well, if you tweet anyway, and this happens, ignore them all, poppets! If/when you get married, I want you to have some beautiful Single girl memories to reflect on. Of course, for the sake of still-Single girls, you must remember how much it sucks to be Single and what comments Single girls hate so you don't make them. But you should also have a bagful of Single memories to recollect with satisfaction, like looking at the city of Florence from the Piazzale Michaelangelo in October at dawn.

The Saddest War

The saddest war is the war between the sexes. And quite obviously there is no truce that blankets over Christendom.

When I was a teenager, there were Catholic boys of a conservative, traditional disposition who expressed their disappointment and frustration with women with such remarks as, "Women wear jewellery to give themselves worth."

This was devastating to the girls who took these boys seriously. And I must say it is rather demoralizing to try to live up to Catholic--instead of worldly--standards, flinching against the mockery of less devout, and sometimes blatantly contemptuous, people, when some Catholic boys themselves are telling you how worthless women are.

I am not sure what is at the heart of such attacks, which of course still take place today. It might be a backlash against a tendency in society to blame men for everything bad in society. Or it might be an illogical reaction to the men's own, not inconsiderable, sexual temptations. Or it could be disappointment that not all women are like beloved mothers and sisters but rather more complicated than them.

Or it could be horror that large numbers of women are willing to hire doctors to kill their unborn children. There does seem to be rather a contradiction in the fact that boys are told to never, ever, hit girls when the only people in our society who can kill with impunity are girls.

But being as old as I am, and being rather more aware (I hope) than the average young Catholic of the shocking horrors of which some men are capable of inflicting on women and children, I find it ludicrous that some Catholic men can still, echoing the testier, more misognynist views of classical and mediaeval theologians, hold that women are morally weaker than men.

I can only assume that at the heart of such a denunciation lies some serious pain. Discuss in the combox with every ounce of respect and charity you can scrounge.

American Thanksgiving is Coming

Hello, my little chickadees. Today I was very busy writing about Scottish history for pay, so I did not have time for a post. However, it did occur to me that American Thanksgiving is either tonight or next week and that means the beginning of the holiday season.

We all know that the holiday season can be really tough on Singles.

So I won't say anything more on the subject, but will just open the combox for you to emote in.

Thanksgiving (or, outside U.S., holiday season). You. Family. Go for it.

Boundaries

The question of boundaries has been much on my mind of late because of conversation with other expat women about the Scottish ritual of banter. If you are used to offices and families where a certain friendly formality is the order of the day, then Scottish banter can knock you for a loop.

I'm trying to think of an example of banter you can all access, and it occurs to me there is a bit of it in So I Married an Axe Murderer, although the dynamic is wrong. If you might recall, Charlie has Scottish parents, and his father ribs his little brother mercilessly about his big head of curly hair.

"Heid," yells the Scottish dad, as he tries to watch the soccer game around him. "That boy's got a heid the size of Sputnik."

Charlie's friend giggles, and the boy merely glowers and says nothing. In real life, the Scottish dad would be waiting for his retort, and the boy would have given it as hard and wittily as he could. Hilarity all around.

I forget if we were married already, or if this happened during my engagement visit, but I sat down and had a Talk with B.A. about all this. I don't like insults, and I don't put up with insults from men. When I was a younger woman, I used to put up with insults, in the hopes that it was all a joke a-ha-ha-ha-ha. As a teenage pro-life activist, the numero uno insult was "feminist", of course, which was infuriating. And when I was dating, and when I was married the first time around... Argh, argh.

One thing that alerted me to the fact that I was miserable in Marriage No. 1 was that the man I was living with said things my father never says to my mother, never never never. He never speaks to her in that tone, and he never insults her friends, tastes, religious beliefs, etc. So you can just imagine my horror when, at an Edinburgh dinner party of B.A.'s friends, he made fun of me and joined in the general hilarity at my expense.

And, boy, did he get it when we got back to the Historical House. Ooh. I had not wanted to say anything because we had been floating on the Cloud of Rosy New Engaged (or Married) Love, and I wanted to stay there and ignore anything that I could just ignore. However, that would not be being rooted in reality, which is my daily goal. So I said the dreaded, "We have to talk" and we did.

Poor old B.A. was flabbergasted because B.A. has lived in Scotland his entire life, and it did not occur to him that making fun of your fiancee/wife at a dinner party full of his friends might be found offensive by women in the rest of the known universe. And I was flabbergasted that he was flabbergasted, and slowly it began to dawn on me that what we had here was a Cultural Difference. (Some priest or other warned us we would have Cultural Differences, and we ignored him because, hello, my mother's family was all Scottish. How much could Scottishness have changed in 100 years, eh?)

Meanwhile, what was most important was that B.A. didn't disrespect me. And in Scotland you don't exchange banter with people you don't respect. You just ignore them or, in extreme and criminal circumstances, beat them up.

Having the choice to sulk or to integrate into Scottish society, I decided to integrate into Scottish society. And now I sit across from B.A. at dinner parties and think on my feet. When he makes fun of me, I make fun of him right back. And then I flirt outrageously with another man at the table. Hilarity all around.

A Canadian might be horrified, and I can just imagine what my American girlfriends would have to say about the outrageous flirtation. But our British friends think we're a wonderful couple and that we're an example to the nations, etc.

So that is the very first thing I'm going to say about boundaries. Not everyone has the same cultural expectations of what they are. And therefore, when someone hurts your feelings, it is best to have it out with him, especially if he comes from another place or culture. Universally, people deserve respect, but what respect IS is not universally agreed upon.

"Feminist," I said mildly, since I got called a feminist again yesterday after Mass by a young Eastern European male, "is actually the most insulting thing you can call a woman in traditional Catholicism."

"Is it?"

"Yes."

"That's good," said young Eastern European male, who was nevertheless enlightened. At least, he'd better be, because it would get very boring having to repeat it over and over again. It's also mildly annoying, since traditionally-minded Catholic women actually share some of the aims of feminism (e.g. being able to vote, equal pay, not being felt up in crowds), and it feels odd to have to repudiate it all the darn time.

But that is often what it takes to defend boundaries: repetition. First, sadly for many of us, there is a confrontation. And then there is often repetition.

Those of us who adhere to traditional understandings of sexual morality often feel outraged when men suggest we transgress them. We feel outraged, embarrassed, threatened, shy, you name it. We often feel like we have been terribly insulted, as insulted as the heroine of a Regency romance or of a Shakespeare play. However, now that this sexual revolution thing has happened, it is naive to think "How dare he? How can he not know that I AM NOT THAT KIND OF GIRL?"

This type of thinking assumes that the average man lives by the code that prevailed in the West until 1963. He doesn't. And therefore he will try it on, and you will have to have The Talk. The talk shouldn't be a big deal. It should be merely something like, "Actually, you might not know this, but I am a Christian [observant Jew, Muslim, Buddhist], and so I am very distressed that you suggested X. I don't believe X is a suitable recreational activity among unmarried people, and I'm sorry you thought I might." Or it could just be, "Yeah, you wish, pal." (Smug smile.) "In your dreams." It all depends on the context.

Meanwhile, let's not pick on the usual kind of guy. I am continually haunted by the memory of a Single reader who works for a conservative think-tank and got sneered at by a young Catholic married man because she isn't married. When an ordinary bloke from a different culture (which means the majority non-Catholic culture we live in, peeps) hurts our feelings, there might be some excuse for him: he might know now better; things are different "where he comes from." But when a Catholic guy who goes to Mass every Sunday and reads Mark Shea and kisses bishops' rings bullies a Catholic girl, I want to rip his head off.

The sad fact is that although we are prepared for attacks from our ideological opposites, we are often left speechless by our supposed allies. But we have to get along with our allies, so we have to create and defend our boundaries.

First, we have to know what our boundaries are. What can you put up with, and what can you not put up with? If at work you are willing to stay late because "you don't have kids to go home to," then fine. But if you are not, you are not. That's okay. Just because you "don't have kids to go home to" doesn't mean anyone deserves more of your time than you've contracted out.

Second, you have to state your boundaries, directly or indirectly. "Don't call me a feminist; as a traditional Catholic woman, I personally find it really insulting" is direct. "A feminist is the worst thing you can call a trad Catholic woman" is indirect. "As a Single woman, I find it insulting that you think I have no life outside this office" is pretty direct. Gauge which is the best communication strategy.

Third, you have to defend your boundaries. This is where repetition comes in. Hopefully you will not have to do this to the same person more than once or twice. Possibly the person is just testing you, to see if you really meant what you said. Make it clear you meant what you said. If the person offends you once after you told him/her what your boundary is, that's one thing. Remind them of your boundary and leave it at that. But if he or she does it twice, it is time to take more action.

In work or school life, it is time to talk to an authority. In social life, it is time to keep away from them. If they apologize, that's great. Forgive them. But if they don't, don't be a noodle-spined wimp. Constant disrespect is bad for your mental and spiritual health.

Fourth, be just as respectful of other peoples' boundaries. If a guy does not like being hugged, don't hug him.

I want to say something about the "feminist" issue. It could be that you are insulted that the word "feminist" is used as an insult, just as I would be if the word "Catholic" or "woman" were used as an insult.

First of all, cultural differences apply. Many men feel, rightly or wrongly, that they themselves or society in general has suffered severe hurt because of trends in society that some or all ascribe to a philosophy called "feminism." When they snap at you about "feminism" they are saying much more about their own views than about yours. It's not you it's them, and if they really have suffered from "feminism" (and if you care, you might ask), you might understand where they are coming from.

Second, it is not okay for men to express contempt for women to women. If men want to blow off steam to other men about their frustration with women-in-general, okay. Women blow off steam to other women about men-in-general all the time. (Although, to be frank, my married friends and I don't bitch about our husbands, even to each other, and if B.A. complained about me to his pals, I would be hurt. There is such a thing as loyalty.)

If a Catholic man (like a married young Catholic man working for one of the zillions of conservative think tanks out there) expresses contempt for you based on your sex or marital status, it is time to get all John Paul II on his butt. Every Catholic woman should read Mulieris Dignitatem at least once, and be willing to invoke it to defend herself against Catholic guys being jerks.

Sample speech. "That's not funny. That offends me as a woman and a Catholic, and I'm surprised that as a Catholic you are going against Blessed John Paul II's assertion that..."

This will not work on all Catholic men, of course. Some Catholics don't actually like Blessed John Paul II. However, if you are working for your standard conservative think-tank, you are unlikely to run into them. But if you do, and they insult you just for being a woman, especially an unmarried woman, I suppose your next shot is to give them a withering stare and then say the ever-devastating, "I'll pray for you."