A few years back, Marla Thomas received some very good advice. It came while she was working as a waitress and completing her undergraduate degree at Valdosta State University.
"One of my 'regulars' was a sweet couple in their mid-50s. They would talk to me about my classes, ask me about my major, what I planned to do after graduation and life in general. I told them that I was thinking of becoming a flight attendant after graduation and then seeing where my path led me," she said.
Thomas recalled that the wife suggested she follow her dream and live life to the fullest.
"She said that she had married later in life after she, too, worked for an airline. She was able to see the world and create experiences that were her own. She told me that I would have the rest of my life to be married and have kids ... to take the opportunity to live the experience while I still could," Thomas said.
She took the advice. Though Thomas now has another successful career, she's still glad that she gambled.
"I have had short-term and long-term relationships over the years, but there has always been a constant that I guess has kept me single. I refuse to settle for any less than what I think I deserve," she said.
"I have faith that I have been led on a pretty successful professional path and if it leads to a successful relationship, then I am willing to be patient and work toward it."
In today's world, career-oriented women in the their 30s, like Thomas, are all around. In fact, one of her most enduring friends, Ashley Callicutt, who is also in her 30s, shares her sentiments. "Many women I know have made a conscious decision to put their desire for marriage and children on hold in order to progress to where they would like to be in their careers," she said. "I've been married. In what I consider to be a successful life, I still consider that relationship to be my one true 'epic failure.' In all honesty, my life is calmer and I am happier single," she said. These single women are shining examples of how roles have changed over the years. A few years ago, Thomas and Callicutt may have been shunned for their decision to pursue careers rather than getting married and starting a family. "I believe that the shift began in the early '70s when many wives and mothers had to go into the workplace due to financial reasons. This provided woman with a sense of financial freedom and independence which seems to have increased with each passing decade," Callicutt said. Callicutt also suggests that with divorce as a fact of life, many woman find that they have to be financially independent in order to take care of themselves. After all, she's been there herself.
"Now, that doesn't mean I don't want to be in a relationship, and it certainly doesn't mean that I don't want to ever get married again. What is does mean is that I have learned to find happiness within myself instead of looking for someone else to fulfill me. No one else is ever going to make me happy ... only I can make me happy," she said. Judy Rath agrees. The licensed counselor at Family Matters Counseling on St. Simons Island says that independent women are becoming the rule rather than the exception. "There was a time when the expectation of a happy, mutually fulfilling and sustained marriage was the norm. We all assumed the young would meet and marry someone and live happily ever after, like their parents and their friends' parents appeared to be doing. Now, with divorce more prevalent, the public more readily accepts and affirms womens' choices to wait longer to wed," she said. "Women are more confident and independent, as evidenced by increased levels of education and a larger presence of women in the workplace," she said.
