What an absolute odd day to be re-exploring such an old notion as… A day when, perhaps in any number of ways (depending on how you look at it). I'm just so quite frankly, "full of it..." In-bitten-smitten and in many ways fit to be tied up and lost in ...this thing both struggled with and missed at exactly same old time....
It's odd how so many people are so easily scared off by the word, Love. As a concept, as an emotion, as the fluid expression of how two or how many more people may feel about each other. If kept simple, it's simply wonderful, no? Simply as complicated as any one of us who may have felt it might know. That thing you know you know you feel, felt, lost or regained, even.
Having been recently asked, "So, do you believe in love at first sight?" I was inclined to recently answer: "believe in it? I swear by it." How could any two people embarking upon even the easiest of paths together, in any form or another, not first conclude, or at least concede that they are in, Love? Maybe?
Indeed the storybook version of "Love" (cue heart strings); like so many other storybooks mankind has written to explain things that we cannot, and likely should-not be explained, is simply that, merely a storybook. Not to say, who doesn't enjoy a good story? - Conceding that indeed, like with many notions, the moment a man begins to speak of or transcribe it, the concept of Love simply begins to decay under it's own... words.
I find myself, truly, with nothing much more left to me other than these… stories. Stories sung to the tune of, oh my goodness "Not Another Silly Love Song". Listen though, what's wrong with one man's storybook fantasy, Love? Perhaps this love-story of his was drawn from one of his own fleeting experiences with Love; one fleeting experience in what is now in the history of mankind, literally an almost infinite number of experiences we've all shared with Love over the eons… Me, I read with pleasure, this man's, storybook experience; but neither seek nor hope to share in it. For, beyond popular belief (or just the disbelief of my ex-lovers), I've had so many millions of my own experience with… Love. None of which where particularly anything close to "storybook" (despite each of them a good story, and others, simply, the greatest story EVER told).
Broken down into these pre-owned and personal experience of mine; the love I've shared with the hundreds if not thousands of people I've bumped into over these fifty+ years is impossible to categorize, explain or describe. I mean, how do I express the love I've felt for the woman who gave up her seat up for another, perhaps older gentleman or perhaps pregnant woman on the A,C,E, or F trains? How do I compare that love to the nearly but not "storybook" loves I've felt for the women and men I've been in love with over all these years? Loves that were, are still is, totally alive and is, are, were so often if not always changed with each moment; never the same thing twice for any more than an instant; loves that have peaked with and dipped with every breath, wink smile and frown… every tug-o-war like gentle drawing embrace?
What? Am I being too flexible? Not rigid enough as to codify and compare? Let me expand just a milli-ounce-n-meter further. Given that I have... actually, the word is do… Given that I do, in one manner or another Love everyone I have known, met or even simply been in the presence of and/or even just heard about… does this diminish Love? Does the fact that I cannot truly be angry with someone, dare say I cannot even truly hate someone who I do not Love, simply remove any and all meaning from the simple little word, concept emotionally fluid expression of how two or many more people may feel about each other, huh?
I propose (if only for one day), and even more demandingly simply exclaim, maybe, it should not.
I propose (if only for one day), that we understand Love not as a series of the other's influences nor the outcomes of being in love; attraction, hurt… joy, etc., ad-infinitum. I propose (if only for far more than one day), that we build no expectations into, make no measure of it; simply feel it in whatever form the moment offers, or demands if you will, if you like. Invite it to be the constant "ether/or" in which ways we decide to go about our days, duties and relationships with one another. Tap into Love's powerful ability to help us sort out that which cannot be sorted but simply ask nothing specific of it. Simply let it be there. Enjoy it… after all isn't Love really all any two or more people have to share with each other, truly, I mean other than "likes"?
Love, maybe it IS just a stupid, little, sometimes frightening word used far too often and not nearly enough.
It's odd how so many people are so easily scared off by the word, Love. As a concept, as an emotion, as the fluid expression of how two or how many more people may feel about each other. If kept simple, it's simply wonderful, no? Simply as complicated as any one of us who may have felt it might know. That thing you know you know you feel, felt, lost or regained, even.
Having been recently asked, "So, do you believe in love at first sight?" I was inclined to recently answer: "believe in it? I swear by it." How could any two people embarking upon even the easiest of paths together, in any form or another, not first conclude, or at least concede that they are in, Love? Maybe?
Indeed the storybook version of "Love" (cue heart strings); like so many other storybooks mankind has written to explain things that we cannot, and likely should-not be explained, is simply that, merely a storybook. Not to say, who doesn't enjoy a good story? - Conceding that indeed, like with many notions, the moment a man begins to speak of or transcribe it, the concept of Love simply begins to decay under it's own... words.
I find myself, truly, with nothing much more left to me other than these… stories. Stories sung to the tune of, oh my goodness "Not Another Silly Love Song". Listen though, what's wrong with one man's storybook fantasy, Love? Perhaps this love-story of his was drawn from one of his own fleeting experiences with Love; one fleeting experience in what is now in the history of mankind, literally an almost infinite number of experiences we've all shared with Love over the eons… Me, I read with pleasure, this man's, storybook experience; but neither seek nor hope to share in it. For, beyond popular belief (or just the disbelief of my ex-lovers), I've had so many millions of my own experience with… Love. None of which where particularly anything close to "storybook" (despite each of them a good story, and others, simply, the greatest story EVER told).
Broken down into these pre-owned and personal experience of mine; the love I've shared with the hundreds if not thousands of people I've bumped into over these fifty+ years is impossible to categorize, explain or describe. I mean, how do I express the love I've felt for the woman who gave up her seat up for another, perhaps older gentleman or perhaps pregnant woman on the A,C,E, or F trains? How do I compare that love to the nearly but not "storybook" loves I've felt for the women and men I've been in love with over all these years? Loves that were, are still is, totally alive and is, are, were so often if not always changed with each moment; never the same thing twice for any more than an instant; loves that have peaked with and dipped with every breath, wink smile and frown… every tug-o-war like gentle drawing embrace?
What? Am I being too flexible? Not rigid enough as to codify and compare? Let me expand just a milli-ounce-n-meter further. Given that I have... actually, the word is do… Given that I do, in one manner or another Love everyone I have known, met or even simply been in the presence of and/or even just heard about… does this diminish Love? Does the fact that I cannot truly be angry with someone, dare say I cannot even truly hate someone who I do not Love, simply remove any and all meaning from the simple little word, concept emotionally fluid expression of how two or many more people may feel about each other, huh?
I propose (if only for one day), and even more demandingly simply exclaim, maybe, it should not.
I propose (if only for one day), that we understand Love not as a series of the other's influences nor the outcomes of being in love; attraction, hurt… joy, etc., ad-infinitum. I propose (if only for far more than one day), that we build no expectations into, make no measure of it; simply feel it in whatever form the moment offers, or demands if you will, if you like. Invite it to be the constant "ether/or" in which ways we decide to go about our days, duties and relationships with one another. Tap into Love's powerful ability to help us sort out that which cannot be sorted but simply ask nothing specific of it. Simply let it be there. Enjoy it… after all isn't Love really all any two or more people have to share with each other, truly, I mean other than "likes"?
Love, maybe it IS just a stupid, little, sometimes frightening word used far too often and not nearly enough.
 | Of course, once you begin to ponder, what is LOVE; thinking about and having Foreigner's hit song "I Want to Know What Love Is" is pretty much unavoidable (if you're old enough to think)... So, I'm thinking... JUST what is the most cheesiest (storybook) love song ever written, recorded AND given way to massive airplay and distribution? - If you have any nominees? Leave a comment; perhaps we'll add an adendum to this post in the not so near future... |
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