A Victorian magazine advised late nineteenth century women:

“Marry for a home! Marry to escape the ridicule of being called an old maid? How dare you pervert the most sacred institution of the Almighty!? By becoming the wife of a man for whom you can feel no emotions of love, or respect even?”

I’m sayin’!

Women did not mean much to anyone at that time- women of the Victorian Age couldn’t vote, they couldn’t own homes and I suppose they could only get jobs in domestic areas, as a nanny or cook, maybe spinning or sewing things (hence the term “spinster”). These women married because they *had* to- they married for security, married “for a home” so they did not have to spin cloth forever. There were no other choices.

But me? I’ve *got* a home, I’ve *got* security . . . I’ve got some damn *choices*!

First of all, I am not a “spinster” yet, I’m not even thirty! I’ve been called a spinster since I was *twenty-two*, but alas! I am *still* of marriagable age! I could have ten children (if I wanted them)- give me a week, I’ll find a husband . . . I’ll find *eleven* husbands!

But pervert the most sacred institution of the Almighty? Are you kidding me?

I’d rather lead apes into hell.

There will the devil meet me like an old cuckold with horns on his head, and say, “Get you to heaven, Brianne, get you to heaven; hell’s no place for you.”

So deliver I up my apes and away to Saint Peter. For the heavens, he shows me where the bachelors sit, and there live we as merry as the day is long.

No need to make so much ado about nothing, kids. I’m fine, *I’M* not the one who has a problem here! Maybe spinsterhood is my destiny? I could deal. Erica Jong wrote that poem called *Dear Colette* about great female writers and their fates:

Suicides and spinsters-

All our kind!

Even a decorous Jane Austen

Never marrying

And Sappho leaping

And Sylvia in the oven

And Anna Wickham, Tsvetaeva, Sara Teasdale

And Emily alone, alone, alone . . .

Now let’s look at the suicides;

Sappho- Did a swan dive off Cape Lefkatas; MARRIED.

Sylvia Plath- Stuck her head in the damn oven; MARRIED.

Virgina Woolf- Filled her overcoat pockets with heavy rocks and then went SWIMMING; MARRIED.

Anna Wickham- Casually sent her son out to shovel snow so she could hang herself in private; MARRIED.

And on. And on. And on. I guess it’s either become an old maid . . . or think of a spectacular way to OFF myself.

Then again, Erica Jong – MARRIED. MARRIED. MARRIED. MARRIED. Four times.

And she’s still flying.

True, Jane Austen never married, but who the hell cares? She was *JANE AUSTEN!* She was polite, she had class and decorum, she was a model woman of her time! She probably fell in love with the stable boy, whom her parents didn’t approve of . . . it could never be.

But *still*, she brought us Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett! There are both stage and movie adaptations of almost everything she ever wrote! TV specials, mini series extravaganzas and dude- the bitch, like, totally brought us CLUELESS!

*AS IF* anyone cares whether she was ever married!

She was JANE freaking AUSTEN!

And don’t even get me started on Emily Bronte!

Arrrrgh. I don’t even know how to end this, it’s kind of all over the place. There is no way to save this article and I don’t feel like typing anymore. I think I’m gonna jump ship and go get a burrito- I hope the dude that always gives me free guacamole is working.

Bye now.

The End