Single, not sorry

They call me “leftover,” like I’m food past its expiration date. They say my time is running out, as if love comes with a deadline. At every wedding, every family gathering, and every casual conversation, the same tired questions follow me like a shadow—When will you marry? Don’t you want a home? A husband? Children?

I smile. I nod. I change the subject. How do you explain to a world obsessed with marriage that a woman’s worth isn’t tied to a man’s last name?

My parents worry, their love laced with silent panic. My mother prays harder, and my father sighs longer. They think I don’t hear their hushed conversations at night. They think I don’t notice their fear in every conversation. They want the best for me, but to them, “best” looks like a wedding ring, not freedom.

Then there are the matchmakers, friends, aunties, and strangers who suddenly turn into Cupid. They parade suitors like products on a shelf, as if love is something you pick, pay for, and take home in a shopping bag. They whisper, Don’t be too picky; lower your standards; manage what you can get. As if settling is the only option left for a woman who dares to exist past a certain age, single.

And when I don’t bend, they turn cruel. Maybe she’s difficult. Maybe she’s cursed. Maybe she was too wild in her youth, and now she’s paying the price. Because in this world, a woman must always be at fault for the life she chooses or the one that chooses her.

But let them talk.

Let them assume, let them whisper, let them throw pity my way like I’m something broken that needs fixing. Because I am not ashamed. I am not waiting, desperate, and incomplete. I refuse to shrink under the weight of their expectations. I refuse to trade my peace for rushed love and my freedom for a forced union.

If marriage comes, it will be on God's terms, not as a prize for endurance or a trophy for survival. Until then, I live. Fully. Boldly. Without apology. Because being single is not a curse. And I am not sorry.

Aishatu Sali

Boddobodes