There are some words that just don’t go together. Like safe and sex. If you ask me, the term safe sex is a contradiction in terms. There is nothing safe about sex. You could catch something infectious or get pregnant or end up falling in love with someone who doesn’t even give a damn about you. Another is responsible drinking. I don’t know what could be more irresponsible than partaking of a substance that will obviously impair your thinking and sense of judgment. Unless the meaning of the word responsible has changed….

But there are some words that put together, form phrases that leave the sweet taste of vanilla on the tongue when you pronounce them. Like happily married.  Happily married. Happily married means being loved just the way you are and loving the other party back the way they are. It means having a companion who walks with you and believes you. Happily married means falling out and making up again soon enough.  Happily married means crying together.  Happily married means looking into each other’s eyes and holding hands. Happily married is knowing that you got the best.

But I know for sure that someone reading this post could swear by their middle name that happily married is a contradiction in terms.

And why wouldn’t they? Ask anyone and they will tell you of a very unhappy marriage they know. Theirs, their parents’, a friend’s, a neighbor’s , a public figure’s…

We hadn’t even dried our tears mourning Wambui Kabiru, a former news reporter who was found murdered in her house allegedly by her husband, when renown Olympic marathon champion Samwel Wanjiru,  jumps off his balcony to his death following or to avoid a row with his wife. It is yet to be established. What is established is that he was in an unhappy marriage and it played a big role in causing his death. Some say that he was having marital problems because he got married too young; that young marriages are under siege. I don’t buy that. It is true that a certain measure of maturity is needed to sustain a marriage but marriages do not fail because the two people married are too young. Hardly.

Marriages fail because people marry for the wrong reasons. Marriages fail because people marry people they are not friends with and soon boredom checks in and they say ‘marriage is boring’. Marriages fail because the people therein do not nurture them. Marriages fail because people are too busy chasing promotions at work that they forget to spend time with their spouses. Marriages fail because people think that a marriage will flourish effortlessly. Marriages fail because people do not go for who they really want because they are too afraid to. Then once they are married to a person they do not really love, they seek an escape route to the arms of the one they really loved. Marriages fail because people do not appreciate who they have. Marriages fail because people take them(selves) too seriously…

*Said in the Desperate housewives narrator’s voice* Yeees. There are  words, that when put together, form phrases that are real and meaningful for some. And for others, they are just but a contradiction, in terms.