My mother’s ultimatum

I’m 63 and still single, but my mother has never given up hope that she will get me married.

“What about that nice young lady who cuts my hair?”

“Ma,” I tell her, “I’m old enough to be her father.”

“What about the community director at my apartment complex?”

“Ma,” I say, “she’s old enough to be my mother!”

“You’re too picky!” she says.

She is right. I had no small number of opportunities with some very lovely ladies, but I just panicked at the thought of marriage.

Exactly 20 years ago, when I was 43, she’d had enough of that!

“You have six months to marry or else!” she said out of the blue one day.

I couldn’t fault her for her concern. She knows single men can be knuckleheads — that we don’t always take care of ourselves the way we should.

The statistics bear it out. Married men are physically and emotionally healthier. They avoid risky behavior. They live longer. They earn more.

Even Mark Twain, a great critic of humankind, found happiness in marriage. He said, “No man or woman really knows what perfect love is until they have been married a quarter of a century.” That kind of deep closeness is what I’ve always longed for.

But my mother wasn’t interested in longings. She was interested in results.

“You have five months, one week, four days, two hours and 12 minutes to get married!”

“Ma,” I said, “it’s complicated. The world’s not like it used to be. People don’t stay together like they once did.”

“You have four months, two weeks, six days, 12 hours and three minutes!”

“But more people are getting married in their 40s and 50s!”

“You have three months, three weeks, five days, 18 hours and 12 minutes!”

I tried another route: “Fewer people marry at all,” I said. “In 1970, nearly 80 percent of adults between 20 and 54 were married. In 2005 it’s 57 percent.” (In 2025, it’s down to 50 percent.)

“You have two months, two weeks, six days, seven hours and 18 minutes!”

I tried to explain to her that Brad Wilcox, who still runs the National Marriage Project, said in 2005 that we’ve all become too individualistic — we expect too much emotional fulfillment from one person.

“You have one month, three weeks, three days, four hours and 27 minutes!”

“But, ma,” I continued, “Wilcox is on to something. Everyone these days is looking for a soul mate — that perfect person who will make him or her feel warm and fuzzy all the time. But no one person can ever live up to our ideals and so we stay single.”

“You have two weeks, four days, 12 hours and 18 minutes!”

Finally, I said, “Ma, I’ve been looking for someone like you. You’re the most honest, caring, compassionate woman I’ve ever known. You taught me what matters — laughter, honesty, beauty. You set the bar so high that—”

“Put a sock in it,” she said. “You have one day, two hours and 24 minutes to get married!”

Alas, her ultimatum came 20 years ago and I failed to live up to it. My mother will never give up on me — which is why I sense I’ll be getting a phone call soon.

“You have six months to get married or else!”

Find Tom Purcell’s syndicated column, humor books and funny videos of his dog, Thurber, at TomPurcell.com. Email him at Tom@TomPurcell.com.