Marriage may be a dying institution

Sep 26, 2010 Features / Columnists, My Column

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By Adam Harris

Many, many years ago I used to belt out at the top of my voice the Solomon King song “She wears my ring.” I especially like the part that said, “This tiny ring is a token of my love and devotion”. And indeed when a man and woman place a ring on each other’s hands they are saying that they love each other and that they will be devoted to each other. At least that is what I once believed.
My faith in this token came crashing down one night in Bartica years ago when for goodness sake I went to the wedding of a woman I taught in school. She died early but I still refrain from naming her in this column.
It was a simple wedding and in those days only the man placed a ring on the woman’s hand so this fellow placed his symbol of love and devotion on the woman’s hand. There wasn’t much of a reception to talk about because poor people simply did not have the money to spend on feeding people who would talk their names anyhow when the entire affair is over.
The upshot was that I headed down to First Avenue for a ‘wash down’. Minutes later the bridegroom was there too. I took it for nothing. Then as I was heading home I saw the bride in the arms of another man at a corner. I need not say that the marriage ended there and then.
Bartica is a place not known to keep a secret. And people tend to see things in the dead of the night when in normal places people would be in their bed. Somebody probably saw the bride and duly informed the husband.
There was a similar story, this time on East Coast Demerara. Somebody had to be joking. While the reception was in full swing the bride and the best man decided to disappear for a while. The reception was in a school hall so they ended up in a cupboard.
Somebody happened to open the cupboard to see the bride with her wedding dress completely covering her head and the best man enjoying the honeymoon before the husband. That wedding also ended rather abruptly.
Some ended for other reasons. One on the East Bank Demerara ended because both the bride and groom ended in hospital. They were partying in an old building that accommodated a salt goods shop on the bottom floor when the jukebox struck up the calypso ‘Down on the bottom floor’.
That was when things went horribly wrong. The floor collapsed and the bride landed on the shop counter below. The groom fell into the pickle barrel.
Some weddings ended before they started. In a few cases the groom refused to show. There was one such at St George’s Cathedral. The bride was reduced to tears but her relatives decided that the sport must go on so they had a whale of a time at the reception that was held in Carmichael Street.
These days there seems to be a sharp decline in weddings. It is not that it is not the wish of every woman to get married. They all talk about companionship. At one time they talked about motherhood but these days there is nothing to stop them from being mothers without being married.
I thought that it was a Guyana phenomenon until I asked Stella Ramsaroop, the woman who is also a columnist with this newspaper. She told me that it was the same in the United States.
She said that young women seem to be disappointed with the quality of men these days. The men are not too keen on the things that men do when they have responsibility but they do provide some support and comfort for the young woman. They are good dancing partners and they can be funny in a childish way.
Stella told me that the girls do not mind frolicking with the men but they surely cannot see themselves being saddled with such a character for the rest of their lives.
In Guyana I am aware that most of the men are not too keen on an academic education but they all want lots of money. With the money they may find some women who would want their company but again, these women may not be the best on offer.
And this phenomenon is not confined to any ethnic group. Young girls of Indian ancestry once married young, now they have other interests; foremost among these is to qualify themselves so that they can be independent.
I firmly believe that the decline in the rate of marriage is linked to the growing independence of the woman. Less of them can cook properly and fewer still consider themselves homemakers. But they all see themselves as wise people who are superior to the men where it matters.
I read somewhere that even sex is not so important although from the look of things, very young girls seem to gravitate to locations where sex is perhaps the only thing that is on offer. The older ones probably say that they have been there and done that. Nothing exciting to come, they would say.
And so we come to those communities where parents placed a high premium on sons. The result is that those societies now have more men than women. The researchers say that there are a lot of marriages here because the men try to grab the single women as quickly as they could. If they fail to do so then another man would grab her.
But when I translate that into societies like ours I would be quick to conclude that the men with the wives would have a lot of trouble because whether we want to believe it or not, women do have roving eyes and they are bound to see men who they may find more interesting than the husband that they have.
These days there are a lot of divorces too. But that could form another column.

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