THIS IS FOR MEN ONLY.
WOMEN SHOULD NOT READ THIS
.
By Bola Adewara
Follow me @bolaadewara
.
.
In these few years I have spent on this terrestrial divide, I have seen how life treats men, especially in their old ages.

I have seen men work, labour, sweat throughout their youthful lives on their wives and children and I have also seen how they end up. My brother, as you are working hard to train your children and to make your wife proud, don't forget to have something for yourself for your old age. May you not be begging your children to eat in your old age. Remember, women can be jumping from one son's house to another daughter's house. Not so for men.

Can I tell you a truth? You are a stranger in that family you call yours today. That house you struggled to build is not yours. Its for your wife and the children! Seriously!

A friend sent me a story recently. Let me quote him here: "My grandfather told me that a married man is like a tractor that builds a road, does it very nicely but when the road is completed, they bring a low loader and carry the tractor away, claiming it will spoil the road! That tractor is never allowed to step on the road it built!

"Same is the case of we married men. We deny ourselves, get loans, wear used clothes, etc, to see our children through high schools, universities, etc because we believe that the only gift we can give them is quality education. When they are old enough, the fathers often become dispensable. The attention of the children shift to their mothers. May be these mothers poison their minds against their fathers, who knows? You hear a typical mother use languages like ...
"If it wasn't for me, you wouldn't have gone to school.
"I sold all my gold, trinkets, wrappers to send you to school.
"Your father was only interested in alcohol and women while I suffered to pay your fees!"
(Now the tractor that built the road is being carried away!)

"Once the child starts working, father could have retired. When he come visiting his parents, the poor father is given N5k in front of the mother, while the mother pulls him to the kitchen to collect 50 times what father got... and the father doesn't know what mother got!

"Once the child drives off, the father is told to bring money from his pittance to buy this and that, buy sugar to prepare Lipton unless he wants to drink sugarless tea! These are some of the reasons men die early!

"A mother flies abroad to visit her children or go do Omugor while the father sits at home, buying and eating bread and ewa agonyin every morning! Six months, the mother is abroad doing Omugor. She comes back home fresh to meet father licking palm oil in ewa agonyin!"

I warn you, my brother. Nature does not smile on old men who did not cater for their old ages when they were young.

Build your own house where you will live in your old age.
Build businesses that will feed you in your old age.
Create conveniences that will engage you in your old age.
Build friendship and goodwill that will serve you in your old age.
Right now, start to be relevant in your Church, community so you could be reckoned with in your old age.

* Old age could be very lonely and agonising for men who did not plan for it.
* May you not become a liability on your children in your old age.
* May your children not wish you an early death when they can't manage you again in your old age.
An old age without penny in your pocket is a slow, agonising death sentence!

Be warned now...!