The Lover and the Beloved

“First of all, love is a joint experience between two persons —but the fact that it is a joint experience does not mean that it is a similar experience to the two people involved. There are the lover and the beloved, but these two come from different countries. Often the beloved is only a stimulus for all the stored-up love which had lain quiet within the lover for a long time hitherto. And somehow every lover knows this. He feels in his soul that his love is a solitary thing. He comes to know a new, strange loneliness and it is this knowledge which makes him suffer. So there is only one thing for the lover to do. He must house his love within himself as best he can; he must create for himself a whole new inward world —a world intense and strange, complete in himself. Let it be added here that this lover about whom we speak need not necessarily be a young man saving for a wedding ring —this lover can be man, woman, child, or indeed any human creature on this earth.

Now, the beloved can also be of any description. The most outlandish people can be the stimulus for love. A man may be a doddering great-grandfather and still love only a strange girl he saw in the streets of Cheehaw one afternoon two decades past. The preacher may love a fallen woman. The beloved may be treacherous, greasy-headed, and given to evil habits. Yes, and the lover may see this as clearly as anyone else —but that does not affect the evolution of his love one whit. A most mediocre person can be the object of a love which is wild, extravagant, and beautiful as the poison lilies of the swamp. A good man may be the stimulus for a love both violent and debased, or a jabbering madman may bring about in the soul of someone a tender and simple idyll. Therefore, the value and quality of any love is determined solely by the lover himself.

It is for this reason that most of us would rather love than be loved. Almost everyone wants to be the lover. And the curt truth is that, in a deep secret way, the state of being beloved is intolerable to many. The beloved fears and hates the lover, and with the best of reasons. For the lover is forever trying to strip bare his beloved. The lover craves any possible relation with the beloved, even if this experience can cause him only pain.”

~The Ballad of the Sad Café and Other Stories,Carson McCullers

A quest for the heart.

The human heart is a crazy possession.  It can be a tool or a weapon.  It seeks out to love, bond, and even at times destroy based on that very love, fueling passion and jealousy.  It is a defender of its territory, and mostly...it is a defender of itself and its own feelings. The human heart houses our pride, our passion and is the giver of love.  It's a highly guarded personal commodity.  It enables and it hinders.  It fuels our passions and efforts yet offers confusing messages counteracting our carefully trained acquired common sense.

I love people watching.  I especially enjoy watching how others interact with one another, particularly those interactions in intimacy.  I'm not talking bedroom interactions.  I'm talking those special moments shared between a mother and a daughter at the airport or a young couple in love at a hotel. The most intriguing relationship exchanges come with that of older couples. There's a wisdom and a certain sense of that long lost art of commitment over a span of 20+ years that baffles me and inspires me to wake up and pay attention.

You can say it's living vicariously.  But I am at the time in my life when I've just about lost hope that today's modern couple has what it takes to surrender our pride, look toward the benefit of the relationship and take the necessary steps and sacrifices to ensure happiness and the endurance of  an everlasting love.  I've learned that it's not always age-appropriate.  Sometimes younger couples seem to get it. Sometimes middle aged couples turn around and give up at the 25 year mark. Is it an overwhelming supply of fishies in the sea throwing temptation in our faces? Is the grass on the other side actually becoming greener? We hear of so many divorced and separated couples actually finding great true romances after they take the option of the great divide.  After all...some people just lose compatibility as they grow and change...some...realize they never had it to begin with.

I want to know the secrets. I want to know what it takes in both individuals to sustain love and romance, and why does this idea seem so foreign to today's generations of lovers? After all...we are all mostly looking for the same thing. Everlasting, fulfilling love.  Why do so many of us, then wind up falling short, when we are all striving for the same thing? Why do we allow our egos, our friends, our family, temptation and distraction claim victory over that one true mission of the heart? I know I'll never have all of the answers...but I intend to uncover a great deal in the dynamic of the relationship and the human heart.