I love love. I love the concept of it. I love the complexity of it. I love the theory and the execution of it. I try to think about it every day. I try to read about it every day. I think it may be the highest pursuit for a human being.
There are, of course, lots of forms of love. I have not experienced deep platonic love without it being tied to romantic love. I have experienced different levels of romantic love. At it’s deepest, it was the most soul-satisfying feeling I’ve known. I am thankful to have felt that.
Every few days, a snippet from Brain Pickings appears in my feed. Today a piece on Adrienne Rich and her take on love was served up. I thought the quotes said more than I could possibly say on the subject.
An honorable human relationship — that is, one in which two people have the right to use the word “love” — is a process, delicate, violent, often terrifying to both persons involved, a process of refining the truths they can tell each other.
It is important to do this because it breaks down human self-delusion and isolation.
It is important to do this because in doing so we do justice to our own complexity.
It is important to do this because we can count on so few people to go that hard way with us.
Delicate, violent, often terrifying. All I can say is, it’s amazing when you find yourself willing to go the hard way with someone else.
I was willing to stop there ^. Actually, I felt like I had nothing more to contribute. But I read another piece on Brain Pickings (Year of the Monkey….) At times, I cried. I do this much more often than I used to. Anything that is deep and beautiful triggers me. I don’t know if it’s because I’m frustrated that I can’t express myself like that or if it’s because I sensed such a deep beauty in my last relationship that was yearning to be set free and everything beautiful is a vision of her not realized. A vision of love I’m no longer entitled to see.
By the end of the piece, I was tired and sad. I was feeling like I need to be more serious about my writing. I was thinking of how I dreamed of a more artistic life with B, the woman with whom I thought I would spend the rest of my days. I used to think we would have slow mornings, maybe read and write, coffee and pets. I had wanted us to go visit friends, bask in wide-mouthed laughter and drinks. Our future life a commercial of good times, travel, love, and connection. I’m still tired. My mind isn’t disciplined enough to write well. My story is seldom straight. I’m too easily distracted. Practice may help with this. I’ve gotten away from the topic of love. Because sometimes, it’s too exhausting to beat myself down with having lost it. Too exhausting to see the beauty in the world and not be able to share it.