There is time for everything.
There was a time that you ACTIVELY invested in playing. Like you could forget about food and just play. Play play play and play. It gave you fulfilment. I didn’t matter whether it was football, swell, whot, tyres, players, skipping, etc. You longed and thirsted for play.
Few years later, playing didn’t make sense to you again. You started noticing your appearance and now, you would rather talk and gossip than play.
The gossip is of course always about the opposite gender.
Then you grow up grow up and started being discreet. You no longer gossip about the opposite gender, you are gossiping with an opposite gender and spending time with him.
You no longer sneak out to play or to gossip with your friend, you now sneak out to go and spend time with and opposite gender.
Immediately after this stage, you are tired of sneaking out. You now want everyone to know who you are with and you come clean
This is the normal progression of life, because at this stage even your parents will stop frowning when they see you constantly with that one opposite sex.
It’s at this point that young men and women will start seeking to get married.
The Igbo society will approve of this noble intention for the young woman, but will frown at the young man. They will urge him to forget everything about this noble desire and focus on making money. He is warned sternly to stay out of love’s way.
He doesn’t agree though, but the society has been designed to teach him a very terrible and bitter lesson.
So, after that opposite gender he used to sneak out to go and see finally gets married to a man in his 40s who is established and well to do. He will get the message.
For the next 5 years of his life, he will learn how NOT TO LOVE, he will learn how to be LONELY and love it, he will learn how not to be disturbed at all.
Most importantly, he will learn how to avoid COMMITMENT in a relationship and how to have sexual relationships with women he does not have feelings for. He learns that money is the ultimate.
15 years on, he is 35 to 45, he is well to do, has at least one car and one house. Then starting from the mother, to all the umunna and friends will start reminding him that it’s time to do what he wanted to do 15-20 years ago. But just as he lost interest in playing swell and police catch the thief, he has lost interest in love too.
People bring up the discussion about him getting married and he brushes it aside. Sometimes, he would give excuses.
Then when the pressure becomes too much, he will start testing various women. Since he’s stable and mature, ladies take him seriously but these things are like a burden to him.
He gets tired of any lady that spends 2 days in his house because he is used to being alone. Asking him questions is like disturbing his peace of mind.
You have had sex with so many women that you didn’t love and it becomes easy to throw away all the women you met intending to marry.
After a while, one of them mistakenly gets pregnant for you, or your mother insists she likes one of them in particular or you can’t take the pressure any longer, and you do tumbom tumbom and pick one. Congrats, you have a wife. She plans the whole wedding almost alone because you can’t carry that stress. You just brought the money and informed committee of friends
This woman moves in and start disrupting your peace. She’s always talking when you are watching News. She’s talking about classmates this, corper that, while you can’t even remember the name of any of your classmates.
To avoid her, you start staying longer outside so that once you come home, it’s shower to bed.
Another problem is that you can’t have sex out of love again. So after one month, you are tired of her body. Because you are used to having new bodies back to back.
You too will start to cheat. And getting girls is easy. Just lodge her and send 50k for Keke drop.
Your wife starts suspecting that since you haven’t had sex with her for 3 months, you must be getting it elsewhere.
She starts bugging your phone and start seeing lies you tell women. Marriage of 6 months. She starts crying and complaining and fighting. And gradually, the word DIVORCE start coming in small small.
Lucky are you if you avoid divorce for the next 5 years.
Remember this write-up each time you open your mouth to tell someone to forget about love and chase money. Let it resonate with you that you are not just ruining one person’s life, but 2 people’s lives and those of the children they will have.
The worst part of it is that other tribes in Nigeria are copying this error from Igbos.
Yoruba men are now learning to be 35 to 45 before getting married.
Getting married at a time when love means nothing to them. When they are fully independent, when there’s nothing to add to their lives and when there’s nothing to share. Just give birth to children and pay school fees. They even run away from their children because their own children are burdens to them.
There is time for everything and to everything, there is a season.