Thoughts on Love

Late in 2007, I began to have doubts about many things in my life. I thought I was going through a slight depression. By early 2008, that slight depression turned into a full blown mid-life crisis. To most people, it is absolutely ridiculous that a 28-year-old woman would go through a mid-life crisis. Whatever you may want to call it, I went through a life crisis complete with too much partying, too much drinking, too much stress and negativity. I dated a string of jerks.

I can't pinpoint the moment when I decided I'd had enough of me. I can't say when I hated being in my own skin. I just know it happened. I crawled into a little hole and covered myself with a rock. Here I tackled many of the hard questions about my life, career, and the men in my life. I still stayed home more, and let my children's love help heal me. I put myself on a two-drink limit, if I drank at all. I associated with a select group of people. I cut out unnecessary stressers. I allowed yoga to actually take its affect in my whole life, not just when I was on my mat. I studied other religions and philosophies in more depth than I had before. I observed myself, my reactions, my thoughts, my feelings. I studied me. One of the most important things I learned about myself is that I am happy being single. I'd said for a long time that I didn't need a man in my life. I finally believed it.

I emerged from my cave. I was calm. I smiled for no reason. I loved my life in a way I hadn't. I walked with the lightest heart I'd had since I could remember. Men noticed. I must have put out an amazing amount of energy when I crawled out of my hole. I'm not the girl men stop in the street to admire, but somehow I'd become her. I could have had a different date every night of the week, and I turned each one down with a smile. I listened to confessions of love from surprising sources.

I asked a friend at one point why I seemed to inspire men to love me, but why it never seemed to work out. He pointed out that I ended up with men who needed me. When I thought about it, I supposed that was true. However, I'd needed them too in different ways. This lead me to wonder if I'd ever really loved them, or if they were simply filling a need in my life at the time I met them. Is that what love is? I thought about the men I'd said "I love you" to. There was my first love. I think that was real in a way only a 16-year-old girl can love. It was too innocent to not be real. Some people say that no one that young knows how to love. I disagree. I watch my children, and how fiercely they love me. I loved my sweetheart with a pure, childlike love. When he broke my heart that innocence was lost. So, have I loved since then? Sometimes I think yes. Sometimes, I think no. I certainly had intense feelings at the time.

I have often made a joke of something I really believe. That is this: Love is not the warm squishy feeling we have at first. It isn't the sexual drive. Love is finding someone whose issues mesh with my own issues.

That's why my 16-year-old love was so perfect. We didn't have the issues holding us back, and once issues began to develop that love fell apart. Men in my life from that point have had different energies and focuses. I didn't know any of them long enough to really know what their issues were. Their energies may have drawn me too them, but once I knew what their issues were or they understood mine, we drifted apart. I don't know that love is meant to be forever, but I do think it takes a long time to develop. Real love. I realize and give thanks to the universe that it has provided me with people who could give the energy I needed at a given time in my life. I'm sure I've been the woman granted to a man at certain points in life. The energy provided sustanence at that time, but in the end the issues didn't mesh.

I think our hearts are drawn to people. I think our souls, our energy, search for likenesses and become excited when they find one, no matter how small. But love, not being in love, but truly loving someone, is a choice. It's hard labor. The rewards can be amazing, but it is intense work. Knowing now that I can take my time, that I can get to know someone as long as I feel I need to, is a freeing feeling. Honestly believing that I don't need a man to complete my life is a feeling beyond description. I am free to be loving without being in love. I am free to study, and learn and get to know all of the issues before I decide I love. I can take as long as I need without possessing, and I don't have to take possession just because I decide to love. It simply is not all up to me. It is a journey I can't make alone, but we should be sure we're good travel partners.

There is a lot more I'd like to say. Love is quite a large and fluid topic. However, I'll leave off here with a poem by Norman MacCaig. It has been one of my favorites for about 10 years. I hope you enjoy because this world really is full of marvelous possibilities.

Incident

I look across the table and think
(fiery with love)
Ask me, go on, ask me
to do something impossible,
something freakishly useless,
something unimaginable and inimitable

Like making a finger break into blossom
or walking for half an hour in twenty minutes
or remembering tomorrow.

I will you to ask it.
But all you say is
Will you give me a cigarette?
And I smile and,
returning to the marvelous world
of possibility
I give you one
with a hand that trembles
with a human trembling.