Three years ago, I wrote a post on “Why I CHOOSE not to have a Boyfriend”. I still haven’t changed my mind.

A Little Update from Me

Hey! I know it has been a while since you last heard from me, and that my posts have been kind of irregular of late. Sorry about that – but I hardly have time to write nowadays! Amongst many other things, being a full-time member of a Christian drama company means that I often have to spend more time learning lines than creating sentences of my own! 

So my posts will likely be taking a different turn for a little while. If you’re open to it - let me know what you think! - , I’d like to share a little more of my writing roots with you. Some of you may know: my passion for writing is actually rooted in creative writing. I started writing short stories when I was probably about five years old, and during secondary school I wrote a lot of poetry and stories. Things turned more towards articles and then blog posts in my university years, but my true love for writing lies in being able to wield sentences not limited to the concrete, but rooted in imagination and free to wander at will across the page.

To that end I’ve decided to share a poem that I wrote when I was fifteen years old with you. When I was at school I would regularly take part in writing competitions, and this is the fruit of an entry for a competition called Poetry Rivals, back in 2011. It was published in an anthology. That anthology is sitting at home with a load of other stuff I wrote and got published (you can’t take the whole world with you when you’re on the road), but I still have the poem with me. 

But Before the Poem…

It isn’t just by chance I’m sharing it with you today, though. Three years ago today, I wrote a post called “Why I CHOOSE not to have a boyfriend”. To my surprise, that blog post resonated with a lot of people, and to date it is still one of my most popular posts. If you haven’t read it, here it is.

Three years later, and I’m still single. To borrow a phrase often used by Christian singer Jamie-Grace before she got engaged in January (for those unfamiliar with her, you can read her story here), “I’ve been single all my life”. (Haha.) And do you know what? I quite like it.

A few of the cherished people in my closest circle seem to be a bit worried about my choice to stay single before I get married – or should I say, start a “courtship” with someone that I intend to get married to, instead of dating around before settling down. (If that sentence got lost on you, maybe head back to the precursor of this post so that you get a better idea of what I mean.)

I know they love me and want the best for me, but I really wish they wouldn’t worry so much. I’m not worried, so why should they be?

Honestly, since I finished university, I’ve noticed that everyone seems to be very preoccupied with finding me a life partner. Everyone except me.

What’s the Rush?

I love the people at church, but honestly, it seemed as though many of them had a checklist down on a piece of paper and they had “degree” ticked, “graduation” ticked, and next was “marriage”.  Nobody teases you about any potential prospects when you’re at school, university (in fact, you might as well be asexual beings)… but suddenly once you’ve passed through those stages of life – Abracadabra, husband arrives! (What?) It’s really quite bizarre to me. And frankly, very amusing.

I’ve been sitting at prayer meetings and been getting prayed for about exams and found myself being prayed for in connection with a future, God-fearing husband. I’ve been sitting in the congregation and been given a shout-out at the pulpit as someone who is going to be getting married soon. In fact, a few weeks after I wrote my post “Why I CHOOSE not to have a boyfriend”, I was maid of honour at my friend’s wedding, and the amount of people that came up to me saying things like, “She [the bride] is passing on the baton to you”; “It’ll be your turn next”; “I’m praying for your own”… I was 19!! 

Now I’m twenty-two and the intensity on the “finding-Ruth-love-campaign” is reaching frightfully high fever pitch. Even the porters at my Oxford college teased me in my last term there. Some people have made quips about how I’ll meet a charming German guy and settle down over here. (Hate to burst your bubble, people, but it ain’t happened – and it ain’t happening, LOL). Heck, when I went swimming today and got chatting to a lady at the pool, before too long even she was saying I could stay and settle in Germany and get married to a Deutschländer! She even pointed to a few young guys about as good options. (She was hilarious.)

I know people mean well, but if they are praying for Ruth to find a good spouse (yes it’s nice of them), I would rather they kept it to themselves. The amount of times now people bring my future marriage up when I see them once I’m back home, is starting to get just a little bit annoying.

It makes me feel as though I should have a problem with being single to find myself consistently being told that I’m next on the marriage rota.

Perhaps in some people’s books I’m near the top, but in mine, I’m really not! I have a fair amount of friends my age who have been married for a few months or more, or who are engaged, and I’m happy that they’ve found happiness, but frankly, I say “you do you”! I have never been one to want to marry young.

I also have lots of friends who don’t want to get married, because they’ve had terrible examples of marriage set before them. I don’t blame them: I too have seen some very bad marriages play out before my eyes. 

To be honest, if I were going off some of the marriages I’ve witnessed first-hand, I might be the same way. But I believe that marriage is a God-ordained union that is supposed to be beautiful – and can be when it’s done God’s way. Too many marriages lack the real sacrificial love that they were created to be built upon – and then they become very ugly distortions of the authentic alliance.

If anything, I would have thought that people would want me not to rush into anything when making such a life-altering decision as the one that concerns who I spend the rest of my life with.

 

Sweet Singlehood

As I’ve talked about before, I don’t want a boyfriend because I want a husband someday – just the one. So until that time comes, I’m quite content to sail on the single ship.

I honestly can’t begin to express to you how much I love being single. (And no, I’m not lying.)

There is a load of things that I’m able to do right now that I don’t believe I would be able to do if I were in a relationship. For one thing, I’m up and down Europe, sleeping in different beds very regularly, packing up my life every few days/weeks: I have no home of my own. (Apart from when I’m back in Manchester for a few weeks.)

Giving all I can to my service with the Christian drama ministry I’m with means I often don’t have anything left for myself, never mind another person! (Mad respect for the many couples I’m around that are married and live this lifestyle. Oh yes, to the people that thought I might couple off with someone in this company, hard luck, all the guys are taken!)

In these years, I’m enjoying my life, my freedom, and learning a lot along the way. I can tell you that even in the last 3 years between I wrote that post and this one, a lot of things have happened in my life that have made for some serious character-building. I believe a fair few heavy doses of character-building are part of the recipe for a good marriage, so I be sittin’ here buildin’ me some muscle in the meantime! And frankly, though I’m single, I observe the married couples around me and what they do well and what they don’t do so well. I learn from them so that I can make wise choices when it’s my turn. In life we can save ourselves from a lot if we learn from those who have gone before us.

But for now... I have a lot of dreams and ambitions as yet unfulfilled, and I don’t need to be married before I can strive to attain them. I’m not putting my life on hold for any wedding bells. To all my other single ladies out there, you keep on going strong! In the words of Jamie-Grace, you and I don’t need a prince to party like princess. I just wish other people would get that as much as we do!

Enjoying my freedom.

Oh and to all the guys out there as well who are single – till you find her, work on your awareness skills and romantic abilities. She’ll like that. But no seriously, make the most of this precious time. You’ll never get it again.

And now here is the poem:

Marriage

Marriage is honourable

In all, and the bed

Undefiled.

Imagine

If – by adhering to the

Standards of purity,

You remained ‘untouched’

For your man.

Imagine

If, when your graced fingers

Enclose his sturdy hand –

The tingling sensation

That blissfully thrills your soul . . .

Is the first you have

Ever known.

Imagine

If, when your

Admiring eyes lock into

His orbs of delight –

The attraction you both

Experience is at the optimum of

Your magnetic, reciprocal love.

Imagine

If, when your

Head lies to rest on

His loving shoulders;

Fitting into place like

A lock and key,

Not one remnant of another occasion alike

Threatens to flood your happy heart

With waves of regret.

Imagine

How beautiful it would be

If both you and the man

That completes you

Stayed chaste for the other . . .

100% of your magnetic attraction

Would be drawn to him.

Neither edge of lock nor key

Would be rusted and tainted

By the stain of impurity.

The gift for your patience?

All of each other’s love to bestow

Unto the other.

In a marriage like this,

Love swims diligently to every depth.

 © Ruth Akinradewo