Mobile Phones: Wrecking Relationships Since 1960

Goriola is a typical Lagos 'guy man'. Upwardly mobile entrepreneur doing very well for his age and sex with a pretty wife and a beautiful home to show for it. He adores his wife with a capital A! Remember those R & B songs that have lyrics like 'whenever you call me, I'll be there'? They were referring to Goriola. Even Eva Longoria won't keep him away from his wife. He'd simply stand up and leave once she calls.

All laudable qualities you must agree. He however owns two Blackberry devices. Same colour, same model. One is always in silent mode and never leaves the confines of his car while the other is the 'home BB'. Gori has a covet location in his car for this phone once Madam is in the car. If it's not in silent mode then it's turned off. There are no numbers saved on it, just Blackberry Messenger contacts. You can't reach him on that phone once he gets home. The other phone however has his regular contacts and is always active. He doesn't lock the phone with a password and it's usually found lying around the house with reckless abandon. The ringtone is at it's highest volume and Gori will even ask his wife to read out loud his messages to him just for showmanship. He only receives Men's Fellowship daily devotional broadcast messages and Happy New Month messages on the phone so there's nothing to be worried about. To Gori's wife, her husband is the 'boo of life'.

Don't worry, his real name isn't Goriola. 

Trust is an essential component of any relationship be it dating, marriage or even business. It is also imperative that this trust is not compromised by any party at any point in time. You may find Mr Goriola's ways a tad unconventional but hey, it's working. Madam trusts him with her arm and her leg and everything is rosy in his paradise. Well, at least for now.

This would probably be a good point to site a caveat. Understand there's a line between the ideal and the realistic. In an ideal world, Nigerian roads will be lined with milk and honey literally. In the realistic world, Nigerian roads are inundated with gullies and death traps. Ideally and realistically. In an ideal relationship/marriage, are you allowed some privacy? If you have sworn before God and man that two have now become one, does that include your mobile phone? Are you allowed to lock your phone from even your spouse? Should there be details or aspects of your life that you hold back from your spouse? Should some things be 'out of bounds' for and from the bone of your bone?

I know some obsessive-compulsive phone stalking wives and girlfriends. They are always out for the man's phone like  forensic agents on C.S.I or like they work for the C.I.A. They work with the philosophy of 'all dogs eat shit' so they go all out to catch their dog eating shit. The man now sleeps with his Blackberry in his boxers at night or he simply uses a password that even Obatala cannot decode. Their trust gowns are thin-threaded. They don't trust their husbands from his nose to his mouth and they openly make the assertion. They have probably been scarred too much in the past to trust anyone that much. If there's another girl, they want to find out now now! No time for rubbish. Interestingly, this does not deter the husbands from being unfaithful. For someone like Goriola, he probably knows the type of wife he has so he simply does the needful. 

The indifferent ones are not bothered much about their husbands mobile phones. They are more trusting and would probably have custody of their husband's phones yet overcome the temptation of viewing his messages. It takes a lot of self-control to do that. The truth is whatever you set out to find is what you'll see. A seemingly innocuous text message may seem suggestive if the reader had a prejudiced mind. Yes, he may be cheating but they decide not to worry themselves too much about it. The functional word is 'may'. He may also not be cheating on the other hand so they just go with the flow. The relationship is working after all and you do not want to change a winning team now, do you? Some may even be certain their husbands are cheating but since there's no hard evidence to convict him with, they just ignore.

Then you have the ostriches. Those with their heads in the sand. They really don't want to know what Oga is up to. Just give them upkeep allowance for the house and the kids. Just be on hand to sort out all the manly responsibilities around the house. Just return to bed every night at a godly hour and there's absolutely no wahala. She won't ask questions because she really doesn't want to know. She probably has a covenant with God that a cheating husband is not her portion so she can't even conceptualize such a thing. She even has a prayer point specifically saying 'Jezebels and other strange women fall down and die!'. Lucky man!

My friend once had a squabble with her boyfriend. They are in a long distance relationship and while she was visiting him, he dropped his phone for a second to have his bath and that little voice inside told her to grab it before it auto-locked after a few seconds as he had a password she didn't know. So she did and found all sorts of vile messages and even gross anatomical pictures of other females. He immediately admitted he had been sleeping around but vehemently insisted the real issue was her going through his phone. I was befuddled! They just caught you with your hand in the cookie jar and you're annoyed they peeped through the door-hole to catch you? Should how you were caught matter or the fact that you are guilty?

In an ideal world, there should be no passwords! If there is any at all, then you should be confident enough to let your spouse/partner have it. Trust cannot be overrated in any relationship. I believe you must consciously and proactively make moves to reinforce trust in your relationship. All it takes to completely annihilate it is one wrong move and you never get it back to what it used to be. Yes, he or she may forgive you but it will become even harder to trust you wholly and wholeheartedly again. There's a popular saying that likens trust to glass, it's never quite the same once it's broken, is it? Volunteer information as much as possible. You may be dating an insecure person who was probably scarred in previous relationships, lovingly reassure the person daily if you must. At some point, they'd realize their insecurities are actually baseless with you. Keep your nose clean...

My married friends are more of realists than idealists. I understand that point of view also. Marriage is not easy simply because it is a good thing and no good thing comes easily. The Bible says the road to Heaven is narrow and only a few find it. So also is marriage, you need a lot of work! Now, if you feel you are giving more than you are getting from your spouse, you may withdraw into your own space and start to reveal less to that person. You volunteer so much and he says very little and makes you feel silly because in the day of adversity, he has bullets to shoot with. After all you told him one man winked at you at work the other day and another asked you out another time. While this is quite unfair, I believe the solution is not to say less as well. Your wife or husband is the person you told God you want to die holding. Talk and keep talking!

I have never been good with locking my devices with passwords. And no, I do not have two identical devices to con anyone. I don't think I have that much to hide really. I'm not married yet though but I doubt much will change even when I am. I do however wonder when tech companies will start producing mobile phones that automatically delete text messages and chats after the first read. You should be able to satisfactorily explain any messages found on your mobile phone, no matter how platonic or innocuous it looks. You owe it to your other to explain it. Here, I'm speaking realistically and ideally. At that point, it's no longer about the fact that your privacy was breached. It is now about the trust you have breached by having those messages in the first place.

Goriola has thus far gotten away with deceiving his wife. There are ways to get around the checks surely for those smart enough. Mrs Goriola doesn't know and everybody's happy. Is that the ideal? Certainly not! I wonder how we got by in the days of Nokia 3310 and Trium when we could not chat and send pictures. There were certainly fewer tracks to cover back in the day. These days even James Bond will be amazed at the tactics we deploy to deceive ourselves. One of my friends met his waterloo one night his girlfriend asked how come his phone never rang at night. Apparently, the phone automatically enters Airplane mode after 7pm only on nights they are together. Factory glitch of some sort. He didn't even know he was a stammerer till that night!

Some even do all their 'runz' strictly with voice calls. They save numbers with names as ridiculous as ever. In one of my friend's case, he saved the other woman's name as Cristiano Ronaldo. Some use benign terms like Electrician or Generator. You won't ever guess his Electrician is a hot young voluptuous lady in her mid twenties. Na make 'light' sha come on abi?

When it's all said and done, we will never truly know what we are in for. We can only hope the other person is giving just as much as you are giving. There are no assurances. We can only strive to be the best versions of us and hope. 

So, what side of the fence do you sit? Would you want to know by checking or would you leave it to fate? Are you one of those who use retinal recognition, fingerprint swipes and 20-digit alphanumeric passwords to lock your phone? Even the launch codes to America's nuclear war heads are not as encrypted as all your defense mechanisms. Your phone enters the bathroom with you and you have developed amazing acrobatic techniques to view your messages at incredible angles while in bed like a professional contortionist. God is watching you o...

Remember however, that what goes around, comes around.