The Shape of Things



I've recently started giving serious consideration to the nature of relationships between men and women. I guess it stems from the fact that I'm at a transitional period in life where all my friends are starting to settle down and start families. I don't really have anything against the concept of marriage. I believe that marriage is a beautiful concept, in which two people in love unite in a house of God and pledge themselves to one another forever. That is awesome. Now divorce on the contrary.............divorce is a mother fucker. Divorce is bitter, vindictive, cruel, and malicious in the worse sense of the word. I've seen divorce up close and personal and let me say that I've seen the strongest of men get reduced to tears. I find the nature of love and the evolution of love to be so fascinating. Some people believe in "love at first sight" and there are others who believe that love is built over time. Personally, I have always thought the whole "love at first sight" idea to be complete and utter bullshit. How can someone be totally attached to someone emotionally in the span of several seconds? 9 times out of 10 people are in lust and not love, and lust is fleeting. I'm not going to lie and say that I've never felt lust at first sight, but I'm not pretentious enough to try and disguise lust as love. More than the idea of love at first sight is the more complex idea of what is love? I've always thought that real love involves a level of sacrifice that most people cannot fathom. Most people are so desperate to connect with someone......anyone for that matter that they augment the nature of love to fit their particular situations. No one wants to be alone and exist in total isolation. The question is how to distinguish real love from the illusion of love? I guess to be able to know the difference people must accept the fact that love is reciprocal and anything that is not based on mutual affection and admiration for the other person isn't love. In my own life, I guess I've fallen prey to the same trap of augmenting myself to fit a supposed standard that I believed women wanted. I guess I don't want to play Superman anymore. I kind of like being the natural man, that I am. Since I've stopped changing, I suppose I want to examine why people are so eager to couple together. Maybe those of us who are film buffs enjoy watching two physically appealing people come together in excessively coordinated situations and display dialogue that ignites an inherent sense of longing in those watching the process unravel. I guess in the end it is the process that is so universal that people just love to see it. Boy meets girl. Boy falls in love with girl. Girl falls back in love with boy. Happily ever after. Its the utopian design of romance. Sometimes its a fucked up situation, but then again sometimes it can change your life in a very fundamental way.