She was subdued when she came to work this morning.  We headed straight to the office where her story spilled out.  It seems that her time with Ebogo's family on Saturday did not go as hoped or planned.  Everyone was nice enough.  Pleasant and friendly.  They treated Doris with kindness.  But then the meeting began and very quickly Ebogo's mother brought everything to a grinding halt.   Her concern stems from the fact that Doris's father (the sperm donor) is from the same tribe as her people.  Even the same village if I understand things correctly.  

This was certainly not news to any of us.  Guy had done the work, ferreting out the facts on the ancestry of this invisible man who impregnated Doris's 16 year old mother and then disappeared.  He openly disclosed all of this to Ebogo three weeks ago when we met him.  They were both satisfied that there was no relationship between he and Doris.

But his mother is not satisfied.  She says that Ebogo is young (29 years old) and does not know the family tree as she does.  Her great-grandfather had 78 wives.  Yes, you read that correctly.  That's seventy-eight wives.  (And you think you have problems with just one!)  She is concerned that Doris's father could show up somewhere in the descendants of all those wives.  And if he does, four generations later, there will be no marriage for this young couple.

So let's do the math here.  Back in the day when Ebogo's Great-great-Grandfather was marrying all those gals, the goal was for each wife to produce at least ten kids.  And most of them were successful.  We know a 75 year old wife who produced 14 babies.  Even as recently as 25 years ago when we arrived in Cameroon, every man did everything he could to have at least ten children.  So it is not an exaggeration to imagine that this great-great might have fathered 780 children.   And the next generation would also have done all to have ten children each, which brings us to a nice round 7,800.  We need to multiply by ten for one more generation which makes 78,000.  We have just arrived at Ebogo's mother's generation. They were starting to reduce the size of their families.  Some still had ten children but some only had five.  So let's give her generation five kids each just to be conservative.  We're now up to 390,000 descendants from Great-great-Grandfather.  Of course some of these people died before bearing children, and some did not produce the obligatory 10.  So erring on the side of conservatism, let's bring that number down to 300,000.  What are the odds that somewhere in all that crowd we will uncover Doris's Dad?  Kind of scary.

Mom has decreed that this relationship is on hold until she can call a family meeting and sit down with all the family, her generation and above.  Together they will search and search and try to determine if somewhere in all that mess, Doris and Ebogo are related.  If they are, the wedding is off.  

Ebogo is heartbroken.  He's wild about our girl.  He's told all his friends about her.  Doris is frustrated. She's a very private person so has only told a handful of people.  But she has been steadily falling in love with this man of her dreams.  And Guy?  Guy's not sure what the Mother is trying to pull. It's flat out impossible to sort through that mob of people and come up with any kind of answer that will satisfy her.  What is her real motivation?  Is she truly concerned that the young couple not be distantly related?  Or does she not like something about Doris?  

Unless Guy has another idea, all we can do is wait and watch and pray.  All things are in God's hands and He does all things well.  The Mother says she will have an answer for them in two weeks time.

By the way, I've never been able to figure out what America's fascination with polygamy is all about.  We know scores and scores of polygamist marriages, and an equal number of adult children who grew up in the midst of this kind of mess.  We have never met anyone who is content and happy and fulfilled in their marriages.  We know endless stories of all the strife, and turmoil, and confusion that results. There is no happily ever after.  Think of the problems that are still traveling down through the generations because one man decided he needed 78 wives!  God's way is best.  Always and forever.