Yer Lovin' State o' Affairs

As I was Facebook stalking a few people the other day (yes, I admit to it. But I’m not alone!) I noticed something rather odd. One friend of mine (who I will not name here so that they might walk away with some dignity intact) changed his status from “Anchored” to “Marooned”.

I should probably mention here that I have set my Facebook to Pirate language. No joke. Instead of friends, I have “Me Hearties”. You click on “Cap’n’s Log” to reach my personal info. And when I write a comment, I’m notifying people “What be troublin’ me”. The list goes on and on. Half of me still gets excited every time I’m told to enter my ‘Lectric parrot to sign in, while the other half still doesn’t understand how to change my settings back to normal because it’s hidden under words like "Yarr Vessel" and "Ye Ship’s Rigging".

So imagine my confusion upon seeing a “Marooned” status on one person’s “pirate plank”, supposedly describing a relationship status as single, but having a “Sailin’ Solo” status myself. How, one may ask, can there be two types of “single”? You’re either single, or you’re together. End of story, right? No, my friend. There is so much more.

After some investigative work on my part, which included hacking into my friend’s account that is in English, I discovered the shocking answer to my question. For women who are single, you are “Sailin’ Solo”. For men, you are “Marooned”. (And here’s where I stared blankly at the computer screen for a few minutes not completely believing my eyes).

For one thing, why differentiate at all? Being single is a little depressing in itself. But now they go and give it a name that just screams, “No one loves me!” And men have it worse. At least when you’re “Sailin’ Solo” you’re going somewhere, but where you’re “Marooned”, you’re stuck, pretty much abandoned on a deserted island. So we go from single and ready to mingle to dumped and alone. Just a tad bit discouraging. And the Facebook overlords have it all wired. Pre-programmed into our online identities.

Are we to assume then that being single is as bad as being ditched on an island for attempt at mutiny? Kind of a hard message to accept, but it’s true. It’s drilled into our brains since that very first “And they lived happily ever after” fairytale story. The Princess always finds her Prince, because she would be incomplete without him.

I guess what I’m getting at is be single and be free! No strings attached. No shame. No more picking petals off daisies in the hopes that it will solve all your problems. You won’t be single forever, but you don’t have to live in misery until the right person comes along. I’m not going to settle for spending the rest of my single days on a lonely island. No way in hell. It’s all Yo Ho’s and a pirate’s life for me from here on out!