The art of staying single

I was over 25yo when I  first moved abroad. On my fifth day of work in a coffee shop, a half-Spanish half-African colleague joined me for a lunch and started asking very straightforward, personal questions. When she learnt that I’m single, I’ve never been in serious relationship, I’m not looking for one and I do not fancy any boy at the moment, she quite bluntly suggested that I may be a lesbian. A bit harsh for London standards, now that I think about it. Anyway, I didn’t even bother to correct her – it was clear we’re not going to get along.

These days, thank fudge, staying single (especially in your 20s) is no longer shocking. Sometimes it may be still frowned upon a little bit, but for the most part it’s a relatively popular life-choice. Of which I’m a massive supporter. Possibly because I’ve stayed happily (and for the most part consciously) single for over 29 years of my life.

And I wouldn’t have changed it for the world.

Be a human you are

On a facebook group that I’m part of, someone once asked what being a woman means to us. I commented it doesn’t mean anything specific to me, since every single woman out there is “womanly” in her own way and the whole concept of womanhood is just fluid. The author of the post replied to my comment saying I didn’t understand the question and missed the point. Besides, ever since feminism became a thing, lots of women became over-sensitive and are talking about womanhood being flexible and fluid, but you never hear anyone saying that being a man is fluid, right?

Oh well, I wrote in reply, I actually would say exactly the same about men: that being a man is – and damn well should be – flexible and fluid, cause every single man out there is “manly” in his own way. And if there were some set limits to how you can interpret the asked question, than I wasn’t aware of them. And I left it at that. No point arguing further.

Could be worth arguing about on a blog on International Women’s Day though – and not just to the benefit of women.