Is old maid...really a threat?

Years ago, I remembered watching Gone With the Wind and Scarlet O'Hara, the main character, had a younger sister who was rightfully pissed when Scarlet married someone she wanted and worried she'd die an old maid. Now, the younger sister had to be in her late teens to early 20s, but during that time period, a woman not married nor with children would've been considered an "old maid." I'm sure most people know the term, but if you don't, an Old Maid is a woman whose never been married and most likely childless. Well, this is the lazy way of describing this as the term varies. Yet the question I have: Is being an Old Maid...so bad?

I write this because for the past few years, we have seen a shift in feminism, marriage, and children. What use to be an insult such as: you'll die as a single cat lady, really isn't so bad. In fact, the only thing I take offense to is I like dogs better than cats. However, I think about how women are preferring not just to be single, but also child-free. And if they do want children, I have noticed an interesting and yet positive thing:

More women are having children later.

The double standards for women is blinding. A man can say he prefers to be a bachelor and not have any blow back (most of the time), but for some reason a woman is considered selfish if she chooses to be child-free or not want to be married.

While I'd love to meet my soulmate, get married and have children, there is something unsettling for why a woman has to settle just to live a life where she's ridiculed for not doing enough while the man is praised for doing the bare minimum. Having to settle yet having to be perfect is draining.

I remember in my teens, my mother worried I'd be a teen mom because I was so "boy-crazy". Now, I'm 30 and child-free. Guess who is trying to set me up literally every chance she gets? What's worse, is she wants me, a college graduate with her own car, self-published author and one who takes care of herself to settle for not just someone, but literally ANYONE. The irony? My father is the reason I don't settle. He tells me how I have so much going on that since I was a little girl, he not only spoiled me but made me aware to not settle for the bare minimum. Of course I don't care about material things. I can buy my own; I care about someone who is sweet, calm and a good person. But my mother, like many in society, does not feel like I am not "complete" unless I have a husband and children.

I've dated and I'm on the dating apps and...my God! For the longest time, I thought I was the problem and that no one wanted me. But when you come across men who's literal first response to you is sexual or borderline abusive, I have started to wonder. The more I go on the apps or see the interactions of men online, the more I say to myself... "I'm definitely single by choice."

This is not to shame men at all. I know of good men. Like my father. Nonetheless, this is about how maybe being single isn't too bad. After all, there are studies that say single women are more happy and/or healthy than married women. I'm glad I'm in this era where a woman can be single in her early thirties without shame. When you have red-pill guys, married guys on dating apps, or men who have hatred but lust for women, maybe just maybe...being an old maid isn't such a bad thing.