Barney, one of my exes loves me. He always has and probably always will. Every day, every single day he reminds me of this. He greets me each day with my own cheerful heartfelt moniker for me and every night he tells me he loves me before I fall asleep. He has complete unwavering, 100% devotional love for me that I can’t return to him.
Insert guilty pleasure music to write by: 
See Love…. love is, well I’m going to steal the words that Mr. Big once told me when I asked him what he thought love was: “Love is Complicated”. At the time, I was a bit upset with his answer. I thought it was a cop-out to dodge bigger issues and perhaps it was. However, now I understand the reality in this statement because any more I’m not even sure what that dreaded little 4 letter word means.
Just defining the word itself present problems, you look up the word in the dictionary and it directs you to feelings of adoration, attachment, affection, devotion. You look up those words and they direct you back to the same synonyms used to define love. It seems like one huge vicious circle to me. So the word itself seems to be open to interpretation based on the user. I love seafood, doesn’t mean I’d want to eat it everyday. He loved me but not enough to fight. My dog loves his kong but it doesn’t love him back.
When you try to delve into the nuts and bolts of the emotion itself…. well you know books have been written on the subject. We have biblical love, philosophical love, the difference between what men think love is and what women want it to be, the tv and movie versions of unattainable love. Any more I really don’t think anyone knows what it is supposed to be. We just go through life half assing it, glazing across the surface of it in an attempt to get by without seriously considering what it is.
I know at one time I thought I knew what it was. I thought that loving someone was an unconditional process in which you accepted their greatest strengths and their greatest weaknesses all the same. You oversaw the small and large-ish plights that in essence make us all human and you as a team; as a couple worked together towards finding and striking that inner harmonious balance with each other. All the while strengthening your individuality as well as your partners and encouraging growth as a couple.
I’d give that to my partners the best I could and perhaps this is where my downfall always occurred, because I expected my definition of love back in return. But instead they would give me whatever their definition of love was and it never could match what I thought love was supposed to be. I’ve actually become so accustomed to this that I actually now accept that as a fact and built it into my definition of love. Accepting that their love would not be the same as mine, but taking whatever half assed version they gave to me because in my mind as long as I kept working on it; as long as I kept trying to progress towards my definition of love than it wouldn’t matter….
So I learned from Ross & Wookie & Harry & Barney & Mr. Big, & all the others over time that my definition of love seems to be a crock of shit that has disappointed me time and time again. As a result, I’m not sure what love is anymore, perhaps other than a complicated and a time-consuming process that eats up the very essence of my heart and soul and leaves me with less and less each time. So Love I salute you…
I’m not sure if you could call me jaded or not. I’m sure love is something that exists and a few lucky people out there experience it and find it. What it is to me though is something that needs to be seriously re-evaluated and re-examined to figure out what I think it is, because my definitions just aren’t working for me anymore.
So my question is: What is it to you?
Tags: Boise, Idaho, jaded, Love, relationships, romance, singlegirlboise, Treasure Valley
