All I am a heart for youAll I am available to you
All I am desperate for you
All I am in love with you
~ "All I Am" KiKi Sheard
This past weekend I went to a wedding. And for all my tendencies toward hateration concerning this union, it was a lovely event. You'd have to have a true heart of stone, be the coldest bitch on earth, ice cold, to not feel a glimmer of something, a tingle of joy perhaps at two people committing themselves fully to each other for life in front of so many witnesses.
Considering all the "drama" that has taken place, all the breakups and makeups, disappointments and betrayals that can (and did) occur behind the scenes of the blessed nuptials, one often wonders how could she pledge her life to him after all he's done, how could he knowingly lock himself in to one woman for life?
More simply put… What is love? Is that really love? and if so, is it possible to have the good love without the "bad"?
From the outside looking in, it's sooo easy to judge, to say yay or nay. To discuss ad nauseum with other non-married, non-boo'd up, non-in-love women whether what two people share is or isn't love. To speculate about what one would and would not take, about what one wouldn't tolerate. You know you've asked yourself, how could he/she possibly love the object of their affection when they do such f'ed up things to the other person or take such gutter treatment in the name of love.
I've even been guilty of going so far as to say...if that is love, I want no parts of "that" kind of love. But I recently had to rethink that statement. For who am I to say, sitting safely in my "not-in-love" courtside seats, getting a bird's eye view of what I don't have, that I wouldn't take the good with the bad in order to experience such deep soul-tingling love, or whatever you want to call it.
Granted, there have and will continue to be some caveats to (it just wouldn't be mint julep without the caveats and the common sense). Some things, some very bad things, we can as a community objectively say are not worth the love. i.e. public beatdowns, death threats, incurable and infectious diseases transmitted without the others knowledge. but then you get closer to the edge of that slippery slope of infidelity, unavailability and brokeassness.
So what pushes a person over the edge, to become and remain so in love that they take treatment that objectively doesn't reflect LOVE? Me no know. I'd imagine love to be, what it means to truly be in love with someone, is to give yourself so fully and completely trusting that the other person will hold you down. But do we have a choice in the matter? Some say love is a choice. Others say that you can't chose who you fall in love with. I'm not sure where I fall in the debate. Cause at this moment I have a few automatic love forfeiture clauses that I can't see myself doing away with.
Yet, like the chicken-egg circular debate, I'm not in love, at least not like the couple I saw get married, so how can I say what is and is not worth the love? Can you?
5 comments:
Love may or may not be a choice, but marriage definitely is. I believe it takes more than love to have a union. Respect, commitment, honesty, etc.
Even though I am sitting on the courtside right along with you, I personally can not deal with cheating, a pattern of disrespect, nor physical or emotional abuse and manipulation.
I too am sitting on the courtside. And since I was right there with you at the weddding, and know the backstory, I understand where you're going...I agree we can't judge or critique because we don't know what each person is getting out of the relationship/the love. In terms of the recently married couple, they are truly in love.
Now it may not be how we envisioned love, but it seems to be working for them. Man now I'm gonna be singing all you need is love all day long...
hey mint. rum has, to me, touched on a very good point. love or not, everyone gets something out of their situation. whether they realize it or not. somethings working for them. along with them being in 'love'. but also, many get caught up in the idea of being 'in love'. what do you have after the 'idea' of it wears off?
as someone whose married (dated for 7years/married for 10years-one child), i'll tell you from where i sit -
mariage is marriage - love is love. the two are not necessarily related or mutually exclusive. have we been through all the drama you friend has? nope. but we have issues. detachment, emotionally unavailable. but all marriages have issues on some level, in some way. in the day to day and how it's executed is where you discover the 'love', the commitment, once the 'in love' wears off. that cindi lauper song comes to mind for some reason.
now, eventhough you can you can say that they must truely love each other if they're still getting married inspite of all the drama, that may very well be true. but i'm pretty sure that that's not the 'why' of the union. 'IT', being together, works for THEM. for whatever reason.
i do wish them blessings though. becuse relationships, marriage and others, can be hard.
be well :)
Well, MJ...I have "crossed over to the other side"... I'm in a healthy marriage with a wonderful guy that loves & respects me (DITTO on my feelings for him).
WITH THAT BEING SAID, all I can add to the conversation is that love "standards" are unique to the individual. It all depends on what the person wants out of the relationship. Do they just want to be in a relationship for the sake of saying that they have a mate? OR do they want a REAL relationship with honest expectations? Some people are not happy unless they are all "boo'd" up...but there's a difference between a GOOD BOO (YAY!!) and a BAD BOO (BOO!!)
I think that a lot of people end up settling for sub-par treatment from a mate just so they aren't "alone". No one wants to feel lonely or unwanted, but at the end of the day, you should never sell yourself short. Staying in a dysfunctional relationship NEVER works out in the end--you just end up wasting your youth on someone that wasn't worth your time. That is what ends up happening though. People feel all INVESTED...they've been with so-and-so for FIVE YEARS, so they feel like they don't want to start all over again…UGH! So now when they break up, instead of losing "just 5 years" they've lost 10 YEARS trying to make shit work…Sometime shit just DOESN'T work out and people need to cut their losses & git GONE!
Just be patient and REAL LOVE--and when I say REAL LOVE, I mean friendship, honesty, respect, fidelity, tenderness and joy--will come…IF it's meant to be. It cannot be faked or forced…it's not always peaches & cream (nothing worth having is EVER a cake walk!), but it shouldn't be a complete MESS...all.the.damn.time!!!
…but that's just MY experience with love! EVERYONE has their own expectations on the matter. Just figure out what qualities you want in your mate (which ones are negotiable and which ones are deal-breakers), so when you're dating you'll know what's up. Also realize that you can't have it all!!! There's NO such thing as perfection!
You'll know what love is when it's right in front of your face, TRUST ME!
oops, those cindi laupers song is 'time after time.
:)
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