Marriage

Moil and Matrimony: The Accountant and The Analyst

The Accountant’s Tale

I’ve always said that women who do not watch men before marriage are very stupid. Yes! I was very vocal about it. If you let a man get into your pants before marriage, you are a stupid woman. How can you let a man trick you into having sex? What if you fall pregnant and he leaves you? After all, don’t men tell us all the time that they have urges that they cannot control? I used to think that this was the worst thing that can happen to a woman. It’s the ultimate dishonor!

Any smart woman will watch a man very carefully before saying “I do”.

So before my husband became my husband, I watched him for three years. He declared his interest in me and I waited before giving him my heart. He was a very private man. He never spoke much about his family or himself, but he was a worshiper. That was good enough for me. This man could speak in tongues and you could feel the presence of God in the room. Wow! And he would open doors for me and speak with such respect. It wasn’t hard to fall in love with him…but like I said, you have to watch men very carefully before you walk down the aisle. We had a two year courtship before marriage which he said he didn’t mind. He wanted to work on his finances. He said he wanted to get them in order and was humble enough to ask me. How could I refuse? Why would I refuse?

I have my degree in finance and have always been fiscally responsible. I don’t spend above my means. So for two years, we took financial courses together – as a team – and worked on getting his debts paid off. He became a better steward with money. When he was “debt free”, we had a celebration with cake and sparkling cider. We were wed soon after that. He was my perfect man: cordial, handsome and now that he had learned to better manage money, we could begin to build our own little empire. He’s a co-signee on everything. I have always believed that couples should share everything from the bed to the bank account.

Did I mention this man spoke in tongues?

After we got married, we decided to buy a house. Our dream house. I already knew my FICO was well over 770, so I wasn’t bothered. Do you know what I discovered at the closing table? That my husband, the man I had watched carefully for two years and heard pray in tongues and laughed with over simple dinners was in debt. $300,000 in debt, to be exact. He had managed to hide it from me.

"Did your man happen to mention he was $300K in debt?"

“Did your man happen to mention he was $300K in debt?”

He doesn’t pray in tongues anymore. He’s all but wiped out our savings. He doesn’t open doors and he doesn’t speak with respect any more. I don’t what I’m going to do. How could someone keep up a lie like this for two years? He deserves an academy award, I tell you.

As I already said, women who do not watch men carefully are stupid. Please tell my story, but please don’t reveal my name. This is so embarrassing.

 

The Analyst’s Tale

I was folding his socks when he walked into the bedroom and dropped it on me.

“I don’t want to marry you, and I don’t want to have kids with YOU. So if that’s your plan you can just forget about it.”

We hadn’t had a fight. We hadn’t had a quarrel. In fact, we never quarrel. I was just folding HIS socks when he launched this grenade at me.

Mark* and I have been together for 5 years now. When we first got together, he said it was just for fun. I like fun! I didn’t mind. And the sex was exciting. He likes to do it in public places and I’m not that kind of girl, so for me it was a thrill.

Then we moved in together after a year. He told me it was just so he could save money on rent and not to read too much into it. But I had invested a year into this “fun relationship”, so I moved in anyway.

We’ve taken vacations together; we go to house parties together; I’m always his date at his company functions. We’re a real couple. At least, I think we are. It’s been 5 years of me folding his socks and packing his lunches. So yes, I do look forward to marrying Mark in the future.

Even though he hardly talks to me when we’re out.

Even though he only screws me in the parking lot at his job and never at home in our bed.

Even though he just told me to my face that he doesn’t want to have kids with ME, I still want to marry him.

I have to. People will think I’ve wasted all this time for nothing if this fun relationship doesn’t end in marriage. My mother is in Cameroon. She has spoken to Mark many times over the phone. She always asks of him. I’ve told her how he takes me to fancy corporate functions and send her pictures of my gowns at the events. I don’t tell her how I have to take a cab home so that Mark and his co-workers can take the car go partying afterwards. But after 5 years invested in this man, she’ll be expecting a wedding. Everyone will!

So I’ll wait. I’ll wait another 5 years…15 years…. until he changes his mind.