Don't Pity The Spinsters

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Every Thursday afternoon, you could find Hazel and Violet Edwards, single sisters in their 50s, sitting in Dr. MacDonald’s small downtown office. Once a week, the optometrist traveled from a bigger town 60 miles away to see patients in our little village of about 1,000 people in rural New Mexico.

Hazel and Violet only had an appointment with Dr. MacDonald once a year, like the rest of us. But they enjoyed visiting with the locals who were a captive audience in the waiting room until it was their turn to see the doctor. While chatting, the sisters multitasked by crocheting doilies for senior girls, months in advance of the spring high-school graduation each year.

Of course, people thought they were strange and pitiful, especially us teenagers. My own Mama used to encourage my sisters and me to find a husband as early as possible, admonishing us, “Don’t turn out like Hazel and Violet Edwards!” As if being an old maid was the worst thing that could happen. Little did I know that I would encounter fates much worse, including everything from unfulfilling or one-sided relationships to abusive ones.

But now my sister and I have turned into Violet and Hazel Edwards. And we love the freedom.

After four miserable years of marriage, I got divorced in 2005. And after 25 years of both happy and miserable times, my sister is getting divorced, too. She moved in with me about a month ago.

Now we’re realizing that Violet and Hazel Edwards were way before their time. While most of the women in our hometown spent all of their time, energy and resources tending to children and mostly-ungrateful men, Hazel and Violet were growing a vegetable garden, eating an occasional lunch at the local café, volunteering their time at the nursing home, baking cakes for elderly shut-ins, babysitting for younger neighbors so that they could attend local events, gallivanting to the nearby town to shop the department-store sales and (gasp!) taking in an occasional movie at the theater.