When It Is Time to Say "I do".

Samson was a very rich young man. His talent, skill, determination and some well-placed connections in high places through his father’s business associates had made him quickly become a leading executive in the largest and most successful business in town. 

Samson was also devilishly handsome, in two senses of the word, one good, and one bad.

He also dressed to impress with success all the time. He was always wearing a suit and tie in public, and no one could ever say that they had seen him wearing shorts, a tee-shirt or running shoes in public. But he lived alone, and it was beginning to worry him. In high school he had never had a girl friend, as he felt that no girl in school was good enough for him, and he  worked at a job on the weekends, including Friday and Saturday nights. But now, he felt he really needed to have a female ‘partner’, both for corporate dinners when it would look bad for him to attend them on his own, and because he very much wanted to have a woman in his life for a number of other reasons: sex, cooking, cleaning and admiring him. The emptiness of his mansion of a house was beginning to speak to him with a voice of loneliness.

The Proposal Parties

Samson had long been a great planner of events, the flashier the better to his way of thinking. He was well known in town for his ‘serious business parties’ as he called them. So he planned a series of ‘meet the man parties’ as he labelled them in a classy hall usually reserved for his poshist and most expensive events. He advertised them on local radio, television, on Facebook, and in pamphlets, as a kind of contest, with him as the eventual prize for ‘the lucky lady’. The first 50 women to reply were granted a free pass to the first ‘party.’ Others after them received no invitation to this event. The ones he called the ‘lucky fifty’ came hoping to be married to this good-looking, rich and dynamic man as their husband. There would be music, a live band, with him having at least one dance with each one of the women. And he would rate each one of them after the party was over and he had told them to leave..

After the end of each of this first ‘bridal party, as he sometimes called it, he would send a personal electronic message saying why he wanted each particular woman to attend the next party, or a not so very apologetic message telling a small number of prospective wives that they were just not for him. He made a point of telling them that there was nothing truly wrong with them as such, just that they were not right for him. He blandly wished them luck in the future.

Phyllis, who worked for the same company that Samson did, although they had never actually met, was very excited by the prospect of marrying the boss. She was 'over the moon’ when she was invited to the second party, given four stars out of a total of five possibles after the first one. Samson had made a point of giving each of them both ‘winners’ and ‘losers’ a score sheet with from zero to five stars. 

Party Two

The number of women who went to the party this second time was forty. Most of them made a few changes this time to increase their chances with Samson. Their clothing was a little more revealing, while also being somewhat more formal. They even wore fancy hats, and he seemed to like them. Some of them danced more closely to him than they had done the first time, giving him something of a feel of their bodies.

One of the questions that he had asked each one of them at this party was about their ambitions for the future. This took some of them by surprise, having no good answer for the question. Ten were dropped from the list on that account.  Phyllis had a bit of an advantage here, as she could be very specific of whose job in their shared company she would like to have. He made careful note of that.

Party Three

           Now there were thirty. One of the new questions this time was how they felt about having children – at least three. Phyllis was enthusiastic in her response. She enjoyed being an the only aunt to her older sister’s children, and told Samson so in no uncertain terms that she would love to have his children.

Phyllis Begins to Think Things Over

As she got closer and closer to being the ‘lucky lady’, she began to think things through more than she had before. If she married him, she would never have to worry about her finances ever again. She could finally get to leave the grungy apartment she has lived in for what had seemed like an eternity. And he was a very good-looking fellow, who danced really, really close, something she had enjoyed immensely.

But she also wondered. “What if he thinks that he can own me, and will want to make all our decisions. Will I just become a possession? Could I really live with that for the rest of my life?”

And Then There Were Two

After the last ‘party’ there were only two left ‘in the running’ (to use his actual words). The first one of the two whom he was going to talk to was Phyllis. If she said ‘yes’, she would probably be the ‘winner’ in this competition. He hinted about that to her when they had bumped into each other (literally) in one of the classist restaurants in town. What he did not know was that she had been thinking about how she had cheapened herself in getting as far as she did.  She had once thought of herself as a ‘liberated’ woman, but she knew that she was certainly not acting that way now.

           He said, “You will be my bride if you say a simple ‘yes’ right now”. Much to his surprise, she was silent, not saying anything for over a minute, long enough for him to worry about the situation. He then asked her rather fiercely, “Does your silence mean that you want to turn down my offer.”   Her response was an ironic,  “I do.”