It’s guilt edged
Glamorous and sleek by design
You know it’s jealous by nature
False and unkind
It’s hard and restrained
And it’s totally cool
It touches and it teases
As you stumble in the debris—Love Is A Stranger/the Eurythmics
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
—1 Corinthians/13:4-7
The course of true love never did run smooth.
—William Shakespeare
When I was (so very, very) young, I fell in love.
It was one of the most important things that has ever happened to me. For good or bad, it’s one of the biggest reasons I am who I am as an adult. Why I react (or don’t) the way I do. How I interact (or don’t) with other people.
The boy I fell in love with as a teenager is not the man I’m married to today. Who, let’s just get this out there, I love very much.
Wait, what?! You said True Love!
Yes. And I meant it. In both cases.
Unlike the shingleback skink and French angelfish, humans do not normally mate for life. You thought I was going to go with something a little more noble, didn’t you? Just because I said True Love.
C’mon. It’s love. Love.
Love is big.
Complicated.
Messy.
Dirty.
Sweaty.
Sweet.
Sad.
Tough.
Tender.
Simple.
Hard.
Everything.
Any time you love someone, it changes you. Mostly, I think, for the better. But I do think that it molds you more as a person if it happens at a young age. You don’t have any of an adult’s defenses in place. Your personality and character are still being formed. You’re more malleable.
I sometimes wonder if having such a glowing experience of first love was good for me in the long term. On one hand, it was wonderful. There aren’t enough superlatives. On the other hand, it pretty much ruined me for anything else for a long time. I might have dealt with it better if I’d been older, but if I’d been older I might not have been so open to it and it might not have been as wonderful. Maybe. Could be. Or not. In any case, it was one of the things that made me who I am now.
Would I trade it if I could?
No fucking way.
I wouldn’t trade any of my experiences, even the bad ones. If I did, who knows who I’d end up being. Certainly not who I am.
People don’t like to admit it, but often Love has a lot more in common with “Love is a Stranger” than it does with 1 Corinthians. Love is both awful and awe inspiring. It’s wonderful and swoony and it makes you wonder if you’re losing your fucking mind. Sometimes it’s permanent. Sometimes it’s not. It makes you happy, and it makes you miserable. It makes you want to live, and it makes you want to open a vein. Sometimes your own vein, sometimes their vein.
Mostly, love is. It just is.
If you love someone, and that person doesn’t do something really horrendous to change how you feel, I think you love them forever. Sometimes you love them forever anyway. It’s always part of you, they are always part of you.
I’ve been very lucky.