the shelf

So being an unmarried Asian woman in her mid twenties, you find yourself constantly asked when the "big day" is. The fact is that in this part of the world, once you hit your thirties you're pretty much "over the hill" and it is assumed you will sit on that shelf indefinitely. The assumption is also that you were "too picky" and should have settled.

But what if I don't want to settle. I don't need a man for survival and apparently it's not entirely ethically sound to procreate anyway in this overpopulated world of ours. Surely this is one of the biggest most life changing decisions I will ever make in my life and I should be a little "picky". The rest of you can be happy in a loveless unhappy marriage or fall prey to the divorce statistic. Me, I'll pass on it it that is really the choice I have to make. Perhaps Disney gave me unrealistic expectations on love, but really, the rest of my life is practical, let this be one one thing I'm allowed a little impracticality about. Let me FALL in love and not DECIDE to love. Sure I will need to be practical about some aspects, and I truly believe that staying in love is a decision we make, but allow me a little magic and let me fall. Let it not be true that falling head over heels in love is purely the forte of hormonal teens.

Allow me the luxury of growing old with someone I adore, of kissing in the rain in that wild ecstatic moment when I say yes to spending the rest of my life with him, of missing him when he's on a business trip when i'm 55, of the possibility of dancing the funky chicken on my 50th wedding anniversary.

Give me all that and I will gladly take the tears and tantrums, the miscommunication and the unintentional broken promise, the smelly socks and the snores.

I know the road will be rocky, just let me walk this broken road with someone I truly believe will last the journey. Failing that, be happy for me that I _chose_ to walk the road alone.