Then Ale asked me "Why do you love me?" I responded with what my wine infused brain thought at the time... which was, essentially that I find him kind, I respect him, and because my body and soul tells me to. He is loveable.
But - the question stayed with me.... because this is a very serious question.
The short answer, and the most accurate answer is "Because I CHOOSE to". It is a choice I make in spite of my fear that he may not know that love is a choice - or my even deeper fear that it is one he will not or cannot choose. I choose it even while living in a deep and secret dread that I am not, ultimately, loveable, and that no one will ever really love me... (and I wonder if this too isnt just part of the human condition - to never feel worthy of love....)
His question itself led me back to the primary question. Do I really love him? (Because this is, I think, the question he was really asking...) The problem is that we have never discussed what actually constitutes love. I do not even know if we are working on the same definition of love.
love(lv)
n.
1. A deep, tender, ineffable feeling of affection and solicitude toward a person, such as that arising from kinship, recognition of attractive qualities, or a sense of underlying oneness.
2. A feeling of intense desire and attraction toward a person with whom one is disposed to make a pair; the emotion of sex and romance.
3. An intense emotional attachment, as for a pet or treasured object.
Every single dictionary I looked at gave this same generic answer. If a lawyer asked me, based on the dictionary definition of love - "Do you love this man?" - clearly the answer is yes. I imagine, based on this deinintion, his answer would also be yes.
Is love itself so simple? Yes.... it is. And it's not. Because attached to this simple and very clear feeling is the concept of "want". Along with romantic love is the concept of commitment, of what comes next? What happens when the passion fades? What happens if the time comes when the desire vanishes, and the fights begin, and the person you loved becomes someone else, someone you hate? What if you think you really love someone, but you are wrong?
Broken hearts are as inevitable as death. You can love someone all the days of your life, but eventually, someone dies, and someones heart is broken. There is only one way to avoid a broken heart, and that is to choose not to love at all. A broken heart means you are human, in the best sense, and that you have tried to live your life keeping your heart open, and soft, and vulnerable.
This is where the dictionary becomes useless... because, in the dictionary, love is a noun. And love is not a noun. It is a verb. It is an action, it is a choice, it is something in movement, and it is a living thing. At its greatest, it is a commitment two people make to each other - to protect and nurture that love and each other, to protect that state of oneness that love can bring.
So? Do I love you? With the limited information I have, yes. You share my bed, you share my time, but you do not share your life with me. I love you to the depth you have allowed, and perhaps just a little bit further.
Why do I love you? Because your spirit called to mine, and mine responded. When I am with you, I experience a sense of peace and oneness. I am happy when I am around you. You make my world a better place, just for being in it.
Is this forever? I don't know. It is a decision that we will make when the time comes for decisions of that sort. I can only tell you that if the time ever comes when I decide to give you my whole heart - and you decide to give me yours - your heart would have no safer home than with mine.
My love to you is freely given, to the best of my ability and to the depth it is allowed. I cannot make you love me, any more than I can make the sun rise in the morning. More - I do not want to "make" you do anything. All things must come in their own time.
I want your love, yes - but love must be freely given - because this is the nature of all things sacred.
4 comments:
Ah...the risk of a younger lover.
You are educating him, do you realize that? With all your sophistication and learning, you are teaching him about love. Yes, pouring water from a broken vessel, but, darling, we're all broken vessels.
What you do is wonderful. What you risk is huge....what if he grows and learns all these things from me and then....??
You can't gauge that. You have to plunge on. (See your previous posting about not living in fear any more.)
The obvious "snipey" sounding answer might be, "be happy...this is good work you do and you are creating learning, growth and love."
But that always sounds so pale when one sits in a chair looking at what one WANTS versus what one HAS. And how the jump from the latter to the former is so small....but so monumental.
Personally, I would encourage (not command) you to be happy because you have a brilliant life that you created from whole cloth and a wonderful child. And that if you fear that Ale isn't enough...or that he's all there is...or any of a number of things....to remember that "lack" is a myth perpetrated by the powerful to keep the rest of us in check. Life is about abundance. There is an abundance of love out there. There is an abundance of possibility out there. The only problem is that we aren't in the garden any more...we must always toil before we reap.
That's all. Not even dramatic. Just boring. Toil...then reap.
You're toiling now...how's your crop coming?
I think the crop is withering from over care.
Its how I kill my plants too. I love them til they lose interest in living, and drop dead on me.
Unlike plants, we humans can discover our hardiness. It's how we developed. Simple creatures from the eden of Africa were faced with climate change, and moved around until they found themselves in Northern Europe (?) and, confronted with snow, grew body hair and a predilection for coverings, hats and bow ties.
We are all evolving. What's your patience level with his evolution? And is he working at it or just being lazy?
I think he has gotten pretty lazy. He is a bit lazy by nature, I think. As a matter of fact, those things I perceive as disinterest may just be laziness.
He used to be a pretty important buddhist in the local buddhist society... but he stopped, because he just didnt like the politics, so he stopped practicing.
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