Prince, thou art sad,

Get thee a wife,

Get thee a wife.

— Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

That’s the sage advice given to people back in the day who were sad, for conventional wisdom at the time suggested that marriage would cure sadness, take away all feelings of melancholy, bring back mirth and joy to a despondent life.

Well I’m sure that it cured many ailments, even as it brought new ones into the picture, but it’s all about balance, taking the bad with the good.

Thou art sad, get thee a wife, thou art sad, get thee a husband. If only it were that simple. Yes, marriage seemed to be the panacea for all ills, and it must be true, or many people would not do it and continue to do so, taking the plunge, tying the knot, jumping the broom.

So, clearly, marriage is a win-win proposition, but for somebody to win, somebody has to lose. Surely this can’t be true, for there is no losing in marriage; after all, it cures all ills and is the remedy for sadness.

Well, based on my findings and observations, not everyone wins in marriage, and at one point or another somebody loses, for somebody done somebody wrong, as the song says.

Interestingly, this may not be gender specific, for some men may win and women lose, while conversely some women may win while the men lose. Lose what though, and win what? We’ll find out more, right after these responses to what I had to say about ‘Underestimating women’.

Hi Tony,

I knew from an early age that women were smarter than men. Girls develop faster than boys — body and mind. Girls at puberty have to withstand monthly cycles of pain, while boys have sweet dreams. Most of my bosses were smart women, while male bosses were all about ego. Boys will always be boys, while girls become women.

Samuel

Hey Tony,

Any man who says that women are inferior should have his head examined or get himself educated about the ways of women and how they have to cope in this world with the odds stacked against them. Of course, women are smaller and most times physically weaker, but they more than make up for this with their other attributes. Just see how a man reacts to getting sick with a little cold, then compare that to a woman’s resilience. Women don’t run away, they stay and raise the children.

Maria

In no sport on Earth are there two winners. One team wins and the other loses, one runner crosses the line first and the others follow behind. Of course, there are rare cases of a dead heat, but with modern technology both runners can be separated even by 1,000th of a second to determine the winner.

That’s just the painful reality, often summed up by the words “the joy of victory, the agony of defeat”. To the victor the spoils, the winner is happy, the loser is sad. Sad, sad? Get thee a wife.

Now you’re going to ask if marriage should be compared to a sport. Well, quite possibly, for some people see it as a contest to see who gets the spoils, who conquers, and who comes out the winner. Believe it or not, some men feel that way, as do some women.

“She not getting the better of me, I going to win every argument.”

“If him think say that I’m a push-over woman, him better think again.”

Right then and there you have two jousting combatants, both swearing not to give in, not budging an inch, no quarter asked, no quarter given.

But what about the regular people who have no axe to grind and no such combative expectations but simply go into marriage with positive hopes and dreams? Are they winners or losers there too? I daresay that there are, based on my findings.

Men go into marriage based on certain hormones mixing and percolating in their bodies. He is attracted by the beauty of the woman, for real or imagined beauty is not only in the eyes of the beholder, but it’s relative. What’s beautiful to him is not necessarily beautiful to you, but what’s important is that he sees beauty in her.

I stress the importance of beauty, for a man is sexually turned on by what he sees, and if he sees ugly, he will not be turned on, and if he’s not turned on, there is no marriage.

So the woman who turns him on wins there, for all she has to do is show up looking beautiful in the man’s eyes and she has him wrapped around her little finger, has him tethered lock, stock, and barrel.

So he marries her only to discover that even though she’s beautiful in his eyes, it’s all a façade, for she has little interest in him physically. This has been the experience of many men who I have spoken to, who bemoan the fact that their women have no interest in conjugal relations. I have addressed this from time to time.

“Man, as soon as we got married and the honeymoon done, she lock shop pon me.”

How often have we heard that from harried husbands, and how often have countless men suffered from unwanted celibacy due to wives who are less than accommodating in the bedroom? There is an old saying that marriage is a sure cure for sex. In fact, there is a book by Liam Naden titled Sexless Marriage Cure, so don’t just take my word for it. The man loses here.

I saw a recent survey that asked 100 women to rate their husband’s sex drive on a scale of one to 10. Most of them rated it as nine, so they know how men are, they know, yet they deny the men. I wish that they did a survey on women’s sex drive also, but I may have to do that research myself.

Women go into marriage with high expectations and usually choose carefully before they take that leap. They want to be protected and provided for. If they’re lucky they marry a man who is well off and can satisfy those needs. But that’s not always the case.

No woman wants to marry a man who has no ambition, so if she’s beautiful and can attract a well-off man to marry her, she wins.

Most men relish their independence and guard it well, and it’s perceived — real or imagined — that marriage will take that away, for rumour has it that marriage has a way of interfering with a man’s freedom and that aspect of their lives.

That’s why many men will wait until they’ve played the field and done all that they set out to do before they settle down and get married. Settle down, there’s something ominous there, or is it? Is that why some men refer to their wives as the ball and chain?

“For yuh dun know, after the marriage, all that independence is a distant memory. A forgotten dream, an unheralded history.”

Just the other day I saw American actor Ben Affleck and his new wife Jennifer Lopez at the Grammy Awards show. She was caught on camera chastising him for looking bored. Clearly he didn’t want to be there, but even though he attended just to please her, he couldn’t hide his disinterest. But she made sure that she let him have it by chastising him publicly: “Sit up straight, fix your face, smile and look happy.”

How many men can relate to that?

“I’d rather be at the football match or hanging out with dem bwoys.”

“Oh, I have to wash the dishes again?”

“I feel as if I’ve lost my freedom, it’s all about her needs, her wants.”

“I feel smothered, trapped.”

So many different men singing the same sad song about losing their freedom, even as the women are quite contented. The woman wins here, while the men lose, or so it would seem.

Women feel the same way too if they’re trapped in a terrible marriage with no end in sight. Their lives constitute a string of broken promises and lack of love.

“You make me feel like a firefly trapped in a bell jar, starved for love.”

“There is nothing lonelier than being in a marriage and feeling unseen by your husband. You feel like a ghost in your own home.”

It’s even worse if the woman is trapped in an abusive relationship, for she definitely loses big time there. So, women lose when the love and attention stop. Others are fortunate and get the best of both worlds, winning and losing, despite the hiccups along the way.

More time.

seido1yard@gmail.com

Footnote: Carifta Games was a huge success as far as Jamaica was concerned. We continued with our awesome dominance as we stamped our class on the region. We were winning for the 37th-consecutive year, making some people say that we shouldn’t bother to enter anymore as it’s too much of a walkover. At first I mulled this over, but on second thought decided that, yes, we should keep on entering and continue to stamp our class and dominance. The officiating was, in many areas, horrible and led many to believe that all the bad calls were purposely made against the Jamaicans. I have never seen such biased and terrible officiating from I’ve been watching track meets. I’m sure that you’ve seen the reports. Despite that, “dem cyaan stop we”, for we are Jamaicans.