ᴛaylor Swɪft senᴛ a ᴄlᴇar ᴍessage with just 5 words, ᴄonꜰiʀming wheᴛhᴇr she will marry ᴛʀavɪs Kelce or not.

Taylor Swift sent a clear message in just five words, stating that she is definitely going to marry Travis Kelce because he means everything to her

urged 34-year-old Taylor Swift, currently dating Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, to get married. According to this piece, Swift could then find stability and contentment, diverging from a path of serial monogamy and public heartbreaks (often referenced in her lyrics). And by marrying now, she would improve her chances to have kids, something the pop star has acknowledged as a potential goal.

When I was 34, I threw myself a bachelor party as a new professor at the University of Colorado Boulder. Fifteen friends visited my new home for a weekend of hiking, poker, wiffleball, tailgating and the obligatory bar crawl.

There was just one hitch: I wasn’t getting hitched.

Instead, after a recent “near miss,” I began to doubt that matrimony was the right path for me. I thought, Who gets to decide that you need to get married in order to celebrate your singlehood?

In the United States, 50% of adults are unmarried, 28% live alone, and Pew Research projects Taylor Swift appears to exemplify a subset of singles that I call “Solos” — distinct from the kind of person who feels incomplete until they someday find “the one.”

Solos are wholehearted and celebrate their autonomy while remaining connected to friends, family and community. They think unconventionally about relationships, and about life in general. These perspectives challenge traditional notions of singlehood, offering an empowering alternative to waiting, sometimes hopelessly, for Mr. or Ms. Right to come along.

Solos may welcome romance — for example, making plans to spend a cozy holiday season together in their beau’s new $6 million Kansas City mansion. Solos, however, do not feel incomplete in the meantime. Swift seems not to be one of those people who drop their friends every time a boy comes along. She is dedicated to her girl gang.