I'm too young for any kids

On my flight to New Jersey, I was surrounded by kids.  The girl next to me ended up being quite pleasant.  The gentleman beside her was helping her do some math homework.  The small boy in front of us addressed him as dad, but the girl didn't.  I couldn't figure if he was a father or grandfather.

 

I ended up making small talk with the girl.  She was 8 years old from New Jersey, but was in California visiting cousins.  She introduced me to her uncle, who was the 5 year old in front of us.  Huh?

 

The gentleman explained that the 5 year old was his son, and the girl belonged to his daughter, which makes her his granddaughter.  Oh.  There is a huge age gap between his first and last child.

 

Her name was Allysa.  I can't recall the name of the boy.  Anyhow, I adored this 8 year old girl.  Imagine if I had a daughter- yikes!  I ended up telling my age by using math.  I told her: add XX to your age.  Eventually, Allysa told me that her father was 26 years old and her mom 24 years old.  I did the math.  Not to give away my own age, but I'm older than both of her parents and yet I have no kids.  I have a feeling Alyssa was a mistake, since a second child was on the way, which would be a 9 year difference.

 

During my little time on the east coast, it seems like everyone has kids.  During my training course today, only one other person besides me had no kids (9 people in the class).  I was talking to one of the people in in my training course about my plane ride.  This person has 2 daughters at ages 4 and 5, and claimed that her life didn't change- sure, you have to get babysitters when you want to go out.  I just looked at her.  I think I'm too young for any kids.

 

I've been told that everywhere but California, everyone gets married by a certain age.  On the other hand, it's not uncommon to be single in California.  Why is that?