Those Ten Killers

There wasn’t any medication that could soothe it, certainly not when a blast of wind made Marilyn’s skirt and men’s dreams fly. The seven-year itch, like Billy Wilder’s movie (translated to a depressing “Quando la moglie e’ in vacanza,”* maybe to save the Italians from some dermatological effects), would affect husbands who weren’t even exposed to that satanic temptation. And obviously wives too, but the family hypocrisy of the time would prefer to skip them. Men are hunters, people used to say, without ever explaining whom they were hunting. Maybe everyone would pierce the heart of one and only one woman, a very shattered and exhausted one. But since the seven-year wedding crisis was revealed in 1952, the time span for that itch to appear has furiously shortened. In the ‘90s, American researchers warned that the first skin irritations begin to show up after only five years. In this new, impatient, hectic millennium we have now found out that it takes only three years, or 36 months, for the marriage and the passion to freeze like the temperatures in Siberia. There are precise risk factors, ten “passion killers” that accelerate the onset of the itch and its marital consequence — indifference — as discovered by researchers at Warner Brothers, the movie production company that’s working on a new film about this topic.

They are, in decreasing order of gravity:

1. Gaining weight and losing the shape you had at the moment you said “I do,” with men gaining an “apple” figure and women a “pear” one.

2. Badly conflicting work schedules.

3. Money issues; too much or too little is a source of continuous fights and discussions.

4. Personal hygiene, neglected in the name of “whatever, we’re married.”

5. The intrusive presence of parents and relatives (of your partner, of course; yours make lovely parents-in-law, brothers, siblings, sisters, nephews).

6. The lack of small presents and surprise romantic thoughts on occasional and non-festive days, like flowers, invitations to go out, little gifts, seductive gestures, etc.

7. Alcohol.

8. Snoring.

9. Being and dressing like a slob, wandering around the house in slippers and bathrobes.

10. Bad habits in the bathroom; fragments of cut nails, hair in the sink, makeup stains or the ongoing battle whether to leave the toilet seat up or down.

They’re all passion killers that, with the exception of numbers two and three, would seem pretty avoidable. But only if, and this is a big if, the two individuals really want to avoid them, and if it’s not the contrary, as esteemed U.S. “personal relationships expert” Matt Titus (guest of every morning TV show, on which he dispenses tips to the couples like once upon a time they used to do with petals on a king’s path) suspects.

He says that itches are not the cause but the symptoms of the seventh- or fifth- or third-year crisis, tomorrow maybe even upon return from your honeymoon. It is the reciprocal lack of interest that causes them, that makes the wife wander around at home uncombed and slovenly like Cinderella’s stepsisters, that makes husbands avoid the flower shop or prefer the soccer championship instead of going out for dinner, that makes both of them demand — instead of limiting — families’ intrusiveness as an excuse to avoid a confrontation with the partner and finding out that they don’t have anything to talk about anymore.

Seven, five or three years are not the problem because, unless you’re up to occasional encounters with Marilyn Monroe with her skirt blowing in the wind or with George Clooney in search of solace after a bad adventure (equal opportunities here), the crisis can come up before or after. There aren’t calendars or watches. Therefore, beware of the symptoms: a woman who drinks too much, a man who doesn’t shower enough. From the screens of the most popular TV shows, those living rooms attended by people who always know how to solve others’ problems, the expert Dr. Titus warns that when all of these factors are around, it can be too late.

Oh, I almost forgot. Dr. Matt Titus has been divorced twice. Maybe he snores.

*Translator’s Note: Translated to “When the wife is on vacation.”