Love is a funny thing complicated by the sex act. Once we add sexual intimacy the implicit and explicit rules of the road although paved with good intention often have us walking on broken glass as we become deaf, dumb and blind. Love is like splendor in the grass at first but we as serial monogamists often wind up feeling twisted, betrayed and asking why me?
It’s so much easier to love someone platonically and escape the yeoman like work that sex carries with it. I’ve often felt like the pages of romantic love are as numerous as Dickens’ Bleak House a story we’d rather watch than turn over pages endlessly. But is this what love ends up as a pain in the ass? Platonic love on the other hand is love light. There’s relatively no responsibility other than to feel good in their presence or smile when we simply think of them when we’re not. Separating the mind from the body is like tearing duct tape from our chest there’s just no way around the pain. Romantic love is like the thrill of the rollercoaster on the downward drop only to be jolted when the ride stops.
It doesn’t have to be like that but often is. Some of the angst, the pain, and the anger though are well worth it. I say that with tongue in cheek because as humans we cannot live without love nor can we live without the human touch of another. Those conversations in our head when we say to ourselves that we don’t need the headache are often obliterated simply by the next kiss.
Having said these depressing thoughts I end with the idea that I do know now what true love is or what my splendor in the grass is. It’s having that person in every thought, breath and beat of your heart. Even though you’d like to push them down the stairs in a wheelchair at times. Fortunately we can’t be committed for what are thoughts are but love is indeed a conundrum.
