People are marrying their mistakes

I attended a wedding ceremony recently.

My first observation was the active presence of reverend sisters and the countless Catholic church activities at the reception hall but all that began to make sense to me when a friend who was with me explained that the bride is a church-girl.

And then, she added, ‘’It’s only her type that can say yes to him.

Do you think young ladies these days will look his way, he doesn’t even have a car, yet.”

“But they will readily say yes to a 70-year-old man,’ I responded. Gross impatience with processes, times and seasons will be the doom of this generation.

The young man is just ‘starting life’ but he has a bright path ahead of him. He is a legal professional. Many married men who are doing well today would readily tell you that some of the women disturbing them now are ex-girlfriends who are supposedly married. Women abandoned them for wealthy men but today, the story is different.

Some years ago, I met a young lady who was a neighbour to a friend. A very beautiful and friendly girl. Then, a friend was looking for a wife but I didn’t want to raise the issue with her directly.

So, I asked her the qualities she wanted in any man that she could consider for marriage.

In her words, “he must be living in Lagos- Island and it must not be beyond Lekki Phase One. He has to have a lister-generator in the house, a good car and a driver.’’

When I asked if she was OK with a suitor who is based in an African country, she frowned.

It was pointless to inform her that the fellow worked for a multinational company in Angola. I wouldn’t wish that mindset on my son. I knew a husband and wife who lived in Abuja.

The wife came back from work late one night and the husband demanded to know where she was coming from. She questioned his audacity in a house that he was not funding. He hit her.

She ran into the room, locked the door and in less than an hour, a military vehicle pulled up in front of the house and soldiers appeared at their doorstep to whisk him away. That was how the marriage ended.

He met a banker who lived in a comfortable house, drove an SUV and  he married her.

“At least, she’s not a liability,” he must have thought. He failed to analyse how a young lady with less than five years of work experience (and no affluent background) could own all that.

People who can make a good spouse abound but many of those searching for a life partner are not looking where they should look. And this condescending disposition towards modesty and little beginnings cuts across.

So, it’s no surprise that people will keep ending up in marriages with their mistakes. A friend who is based in the US met a lady on social media.

In the book of some Nigerian girls, any “abroad’’ that is not the United States of America, United Kingdom and Canada does not count.

According to him, she said the right things and of course she is beautiful.

So, he convinced himself that she was the one and he came home to perform their marriage rites.

The understanding was that he would go back and begin the process of her joining him over there. He even managed to put her in the family way before returning to his base.

Well, it’s been six years since he hung the ‘Mrs’ tag on her neck and the talk is not that of her and their daughter joining him again. The talk, sadly is a dissolution of that marriage in which he has only been home twice to consummate.

He complained that she was more expensive to maintain than any lady that he had ever had a relationship with.

He also said that as soon as she had their baby, her monetary demands quadrupled so much so that a good chunk of what he makes over there goes into her upkeep.

She claimed that her job pays her peanuts and she supports her people with her personal income. Right now, his people have been given the ‘go-ahead’ to nullify the marriage.

The only set of men who have peace in their marriage are those who recognise and marry women who are not their fantasy. Our men abroad avoid the hardworking ladies around them, who they can fairly predict their character, only to rush home to marry those they barely know beyond Instagram and WhatsApp.

Added to that is the mistake of keeping her back home, where he only visits once or twice a year.