What It Is

    “Love anyone ever?”

    “I don’t know. I don’t really know what love is. Do you?”

    The type of question I’m sure has been asked over the millennium and the answer no doubt is different for everyone.

    “Do you ever think about the past, things you loved, people you loved, dogs you loved? Ice Cream?"

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    Loves from my past? I am not sure I could say anything about love in the present, let alone the past. Love is a term that I don’t understand. To describe a feeling, an emotion, is difficult because what love means to me, will not mean the same to you. And someone from the past, yesterday, last week, month, year? How about our last time around? 

    To be honest I would first have to declare that love is a smorgasbord of verbs, adjectives, adverbs, that can be used in an attempt to describe a situation, a person, but no matter how eloquent the combination of words would be, could be, should be, they will not be able to describe for the mind of another, what that feeling does to me.

    I believe a lot of what is considered love, is in actuality, infatuation. Obsession, passion, fascination, a few words that describe infatuation. It is the first step in the process. Someone or something gets our attention. We are attracted to it or them for a variety of unexplainable reasons. Infatuation opens the door of discovery allowing us the opportunity to explore the wants and needs of another. We in turn provide a picture of what we want another to see, to like, to love.

    Love is also an emotion that has varied degrees of separation. Parents come with an obligation as much as children do. It is inherent in the relationship, and because it comes to us slowly we don’t recognize it at first. Don’t recognize it until it is too late. We don’t think about it because it has always been, or was supposed to be. We don’t really have a choice. It is expected of us. 

    Our first thought when confronted with the word love,      concludes that it must involve a person, persons, people. And yet what we claim we love are not people at all. I may state I love music, sunsets, mountains, steams, trees, and yet when thought about in those terms, love is an attribute given to things that have touched us, helped to make us who we are, how we see the world. That kind of love, if we dare call it that, doesn’t die. It may fade a bit, change color in the sun, grow darker in the shadows, but the memories live in an existential place that no matter the time, distance, or place, don’t disappoint us, let us down, leave us. We perceive them as belonging to us, which is often a problem that arises when loving people; they disappoint us, let us down, leave us.

    Memories are such fickle masters, coming and going as they please. Uninvited, beckoned, misplaced, they jump from the color of a rose, the shape of postage stamp, a night sky where the stars are brilliant, even though you can’t see them for the clouds. Wet gleaming floors, the street after a rain, the memories come flooding back, rearranging themselves to fit our needs, desires.

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    We were friends, just friends, even when attraction got in the way. We saw each other for who we were. I did not invent a life for her, nor did she for me. We existed on a plain above reality where the air was thinner, the sun brighter, the city noise turning to symphonic renditions of music yet to be written. And then one day something, something pricked our bubble and we were no more. I remember so clearly the shoe prints on the wet floor as they disappeared into a past where dreams and memories go to remain in a perpetual state, frozen for all time, not changing, growing older, but remaining forever young.

    I can still hear the laughter, see the smile, smell the sun melting the dew, as if existing in some kind of joke. The cars radiator succumbing to old age, leaving us to contemplate the miles before us while we lay in the shade watching the leaves being berated by the wind, and the roads hot tar rising from its millennium of captivity, undulating waves staining the air, the smell, sickly sweet.

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    I can’t help but wonder if we seek love or are simply infatuated with the idea of love. Love despite the emotional attachment it provides also creates an atmosphere of tragedy and loss. The line “It is better to have loved and lost, than never loved at all,” changes when the first words morph into a question, “is it better to have?”

    No matter the depth or shallowness bestowed on us by love, it leaves an indelible mark on memories, despite our alterations. Where would be without the idealism of love. Our history, morality, ethics, the necessity instilled in us to procreate, all driven by a concept I do not understand, or feel the necessity to do so. The idea of love is sometimes enough. 

    The imprints on the wet floor disappearing as they evaporate, has become a part of what makes me who I am. My relationship with my parents, siblings, lovers, children, all becoming the essence of not only who I am, but who I choose to be. 

    People are born and die daily in search of the meaning of a word they can’t find an explanation for, because there may not be one. Much like our perception of color, sound, affection, it is an individualized interpretation that paints our picture on an subliminal plain that only we can experience and be touched by.

    Love and belief coexist because we need them to. We have evolved with the ability to give our very existence in search of a belief that without, we would cease to be who we are. 

    Seeking love is a futile endeavor, as love cannot be found. It is a master of deception, a virtuoso of illusion; it will be found only if it wishes to be found. We do not find love, love finds us. And yet it is much more, than a four letter word.