The project inspired by my past was interrupted by the present.
In previous relationships, I talked incessantly about love theory: what a perfect love entailed, what it meant, and how it should manifest. The pair in this idealized and unconditional love would transcend the mundanity experienced by couples content to live with a blah, cliched love.
Two years ago, I decided to try a new approach: love action, not love theory. We would talk about topics other than what we thought we were supposed to be feeling for each other and how we should act upon them. We would use that time spent talking about love to do things.
In my thirty-first year, I learned that I was not as intelligent as I had believed about love. I could talk BS about love, but so can anyone. I had no inside knowledge, merely the hubris of a young person.
I couldn’t even articulate what it was I thought I used to want. Fireworks and a choir of unicorn angels over the bed; flaming, visible auras surrounding us, so that instead of doing lame things like holding hands in public, people would see our halos and understand that we were soulmates; a relationship so amazing that to look upon it would inspire other people to love one another?
I had to let go of my groundless theories and my nebulous visions. I still had my standards and dealbreakers, but what I wanted became attainable, specific, smaller: getting up early on a Saturday morning to buy berries at the farmers’ market or have breakfast at a vegetarian restaurant, coffee on a sunporch, leisurely road trips, inside jokes, snuggling under blankets, time apart to pursue separate passions, time together unburdened by process, and plentiful cuddles. I wanted less dissection, discussion, and debate about perfect love.
If you demand a perfect, cosmic love, chances are good you will look at your imperfect partner and think, “No, this person is not ready for this.” You might even speak it. Everyone is lacking when you demand Perfect Cosmic Love.
I may not be ready for Perfect Cosmic Love, but I’m more than ready for Real-World Love, with its imperfections and occasional failures to become One. In Real-World Love, you have to say what you’re thinking because, as close as your partner is, he or she can’t pick up on your vibrations. You have to go to work, pay the bills, clean the house, and suspend resentment that a life together is sometimes boring and earthly.
I still don’t know much about love; you’re not taught the secrets when you marry. I’m fumbling and experimenting like everyone else. And I like it.