In an impromptu bridal shower, the women from different African countries took turns equipping a sister with the dos and don’ts of marriage. By the time we were done, I was nursing a headache from all the laughter; women issues are indeed the same, the world over!
And apparently, African men are just that, from Maputo to Timbuktu. Anyway, from the myriad of advice dished out under the swaying palm trees, one piece given by a woman who has been married for three decades left me in stitches, thanks to her hilarious storytelling.
She gave me the reassurance – which I hope you also get today – that it is never too late to bring that oompf into your marriage.
“When we had been married 25 years, I attended a women’s meeting at my church, and the pastor’s wife asked me what colour of panties I wore!” my sister from another country started. “I told her with pride: ‘White. It represents cleanliness, purity, you know…!’ She asked me, ‘what style are those white panties?’ I answered: ‘the big, comfortable kind that cover my bum and entire stomach’.”
Her pastor’s wife then told her to ditch the ‘mothers union’ panties and challenged her to go buy herself a g-string. She told her it had to be red, and she should also ditch her Florence Nightingale nightdresses for some sexy, see-through lingerie.
“I said, ‘What!’ But nonetheless, I went ahead and purchased those things and waited for a day we were home alone, to introduce the new look to my husband.”
When hubby walked in and found his wife strategically bending to pick up imaginary things around the room, “he was so staggered he took the nearest seat for balance”.
Long story short: two days later when he finally found his voice, “he asked me, ‘so why have you been insisting on those white things all this time?!’”
And that is how that marriage got its groove back. Once she had bought and worn her first g-string, she became more adventurous with styles and colours, even buying the occasional costume for role playing and becoming more daring with her seduction.
Moral of the story for the bride-to-be – and for you: don’t get into marriage and become boring, thinking married women dress and behave one way, and younger, single girls have all the sass and sexiness.
Plus, just because your husband respectfully does not comment about your ‘uninspiring’ wardrobe, does not mean he approves. Many spouses are long suffering and prefer to keep the peace.
I envied that bride-to-be; it was not the usual “brace yourself, marriage is not a bed of roses” talk but, rather, successfully married women sharing how they made their unions and the sex life work. They all emphasised the importance of good lovemaking to the marriage, all the while using funny anecdotes and one even drew a three-way venn diagram in the sand to demonstrate the importance of guarding jealously the things that unite a couple (intersection – if you remember your primary school set theory) and not paying much attention to what is happening in other parts of that venn diagram. Sex, friendship, parenting, finances, etc, fall in there.
For marriage, the venn diagram drawer said, as the intersection becomes busier and more enjoyable, the issues in the other parts of the diagram have no choice but to either fall off, or get sucked into the intersection.
I have never been more attentive to a math lesson! We then put the excess energy to a game of tug-of-war, tumbling and laughing in the soft sand. When like-minded women get together, the fun and playfulness is beautiful.
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