Judgmental Ass...I'm back.

Is it right to assume that past a certain age, say like somewhere in the thirties, there is something...odd...about being single?

Maybe I am a judgmental ass or just a total weirdo myself, but when I see someone around 35ish or older, as I trace them over with my eyes doing that momentary inventory that we all daily fall victim to, I tend to find myself lingering on their left hand, fixated and waiting for them to shift it just so in order for me to make my determination--married...or freak.

All else about the person can pass my mental examination for basic normalcy and competence at life, but if they're missing the band, I generally assume, without even meaning to, that a few bolts are missing upstairs, as well.

True, they may choose to remain single based on some actually superior mental awareness and capacity that most of us lack, or they could be recently divorced or separated. 

Yet, when I notice that that particular finger is bare as a naked butt, I automatically, as if on cue, picture the person sitting at home, alone on a Friday night, the melancholy lights of some news show or another flickering on the television somewhere in the background. 

He or she is sitting on the couch (which doesn't match the chair--an obvious hand-me-down) in only underwear, unshaven and absentmindedly fiddling with some pointless collection accumulated over the lonely years.

Maybe it's train sets, model airplanes, Sacajawea coins--it doesn't really matter.  Each is as sad as the next.

And there's always a cat (or five) creeping around on an emptry shelf amidst the dust and lint where photos of children should be.

Am I an evil drone, a mindless product of society?  Do I even have a soul!???

:)