spinster

Ashley M. Jones

 

 

spin•ster

noun \’spin(t)- stər\

 

1. a woman whose occupation is to spin

 

I am caught in a revolving door. This is unlike the princess at the wheel, waiting for Rumplestilskin’s tinny

laugh and pecking eyes. These days just keep seeping out of the calendar’s mouth like phlegm. I have not

felt the bristle of moustache hair in years. I would spin it into the finest cloth.

 

 

2.  archaic : an unmarried woman of gentle family

 

My mother got married when she was twenty-seven. I am twenty-two. She met my father in college—that’s

how it’s done. That’s when nice young boys and nice young girls converge. In Alabama, the least you can

do is meet a nice co-ed when you’re swimming knee-deep in them. In Alabama, marriage is the next step

high school, college, marriage. Then career. If career. Then kids. Always kids.

 

 

3.  a woman who seems unlikely to marry

 

When I was ten, I chose the boy with the unibrow who wore a pleather jacket in the springtime. I didn’t

wear lip gloss because it felt like vap-o-rub. I didn’t wear skirts because my legs were too skinny. He

walked with me, let his arm touch mine, let his eyebrow ripple with intrigue when I walked his way. This

was it.

 

But no boy likes to be put in a corner. No boy likes to be owned.

 

He said he hated me and took another girl to the dance the next week. I chose the wrong door. Instead of

stepping through to the other side, I revolve forever.