Emma Watson is an actor, activist, baby bangs devotee, and U.N. Goodwill Ambassador. Her latest act of international good will? Providing the masses of single people out there with a way to answer their family, friends, and well-meaning strangers who ask them if they’re seeing anyone, come Thanksgiving time.
According to CNN, in an upcoming interview with British Vogue, Watson tells the magazine that she is very happy being single right now, and calls it “being self-partnered.” She adds that it took a while for her to come to peace with her self-partnering — which sounds like something we’re all going to have to do with our clones, eventually, lest they turn against us, but for now just seems to mean being single, but mindfully so. Happily single? Single but also you wear both halves of a couples costume for Halloween?
Anyway, a lot of Watson’s stress about her relationship status had to do with her upcoming 30th birthday. “If you have not built a home, if you do not have a husband, if you do not have a baby, and you are turning 30, and you’re not in some incredibly secure, stable place in your career, or you’re still figuring things out,” she said, “ … there’s just this incredible amount of anxiety.”
Indeed, getting older and still feeling adrift can be incredibly stressful. But at least for now, Watson has taken one stressor off the soon-to-be stuffing-filled plates of single people. So in a few weeks, when your grandmother asks you if you’re seeing anyone, you can say, “Actually, Grandma, I’m self-partnered?” Then she’ll say, “What?” And you’ll say, “Emma Watson said it. We’re not single, we’re self-partnered.” And she’ll say, “Is Emma Watson your girlfriend?” And you’ll say, “No Grandma, she’s that actress from Harry Potter.” And your grandmother will say, “What?” And you’ll say, “I’m not seeing anyone, I’m SELF-PARTNERED, Grandma.” And your weird uncle will be like, “In my day, self-partnering was something you did in your room with a sock,” and everyone will be like, “Gross.”
See, doesn’t that sound easier?