Seventeen and Single*

So I am seventeen and single – is that a problem? I never thought it was but apparently in this day and age it’s a tragedy that a girl, one year over the age of consent, should be single. I know that a few centuries back it was common for young women to be wedded off as soon as possible – their fathers couldn’t wait to get the burden of a daughter off their hands – but nowadays people tend to get married a little later down the line, and yet I’m still getting sorrowful looks for being single.

It has got to the stage where I feel as though I am some sort of social recluse – like a modern day leper – and that people, through their pitiful scrutiny, have diagnosed me as ‘terminally single.’ The situation is apparently so dire that when I told my aunt (a self-inflicted singleton) that I “didn’t have boyfriend” she responded with a melancholy “Oh don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll find someone soon.” While she was saying this, with a voice full of empathy, I was thinking I didn’t think I needed to worry? So I guess I’ll follow in my aunt’s terminally single footsteps and end up miserable and alone . . . hold the phone, I’m only seventeen! I really don’t think that the single-syndrome is fatal at this point.

My friend’s father had a rather different response on discovering that I was single: he asked “Why haven’t you got a boyfriend?” – sorry I didn’t know that they were that easy to acquire, it sounded almost as though there was some shop where I could purchase a boyfriend: “Hi, yes, I’d like one in 6ft 2, dark curly hair, a swimmer’s body with intellectual or musical tendencies…” I swear it’s not that simple. In fact I think the response of the shop girl would be: “Erm…I’m sorry we only have Nice Guy in Fat, Tall in Perverted, and Gorgeous in either Arrogant or Bully.” You see my theory is that suitable teenage boyfriends are a limited edition, and like all products of their kind they’re snapped up pretty quickly.

I think perhaps it would be nice to have a boyfriend but I’m certainly not prepared to take on some horrible specimen of mankind just to fit the teenage-relationship cult; maybe boyfriends are the must have fashion item for this season of life? Well, I survived quite well without Converse All-Stars or Doc Martins so I’m sure it’s hardly essential for me to get caught up in this craze – not that I’d turn down a nice one if he came my way (the same could be said about the shoes). You see, I really don’t think there’s an issue with me being seventeen and single, I mean I’ve hardly been condemned to a life-time of spinsterhood – and even if I do head that way I will do it in ridiculous ‘Bridget Jones-esque’ style.

*This was written several months ago - when I was still seventeen.