Love...Hmm... Can I Use A Lifeline?

I’m about to reach two decades on this planet and I don’t know what love is. I’ve loved, and been loved, but I don’t understand love. Not the kind you get from and give to your family, that automatic feeling of never ending love that would make you take a bullet without a second thought, even when they upset you. That feeling that would never go away no matter how far you stray and for how long. Not that love. And not the love you have for and receive from friends, that feeling of loyalty so strong you never need a reason to do something for them, even when you fight. That “holding hair in a hangover, it’s three a.m. and you’re crying, I’m down for you even when the police roll up” love. Not that love. I’m talking about that significant other love, that “you’re mine and I’m yours” love, that exclusive, illusive, consuming type of love. The one people sing about, write about, talk about. Not the “I can spend the rest of my life with you” love, the “I can’t see my life without you” love, there is a difference, I mean that love. I want someone to break it down like Algebra, into simple concrete steps that never fail to give you an answer if you do it right. Or like chemistry, you mix this chemical with this chemical and BANG, love. Or even like English, if you don’t understand it, use context clues and a dictionary ‘til you get it. But there’s no solid definition of love, or how it should feel, or even what it should look like.

When it’s good, love is like a drug. You get addicted to the high you get. You float around suspended in happiness thinking of that one person when you’re apart and adoring him/her when you’re together. You sit around thinking up new ways to make them happy, new jokes to make them laugh, new stories to interest them. Hearing their name makes your day better. Seeing them lifts your spirits without a word. You’re hearing them speak but the whole time your thinking, “I love the way your lips move when you say things I don’t pay attention to because I’m just thinking about kissing you.”, and then you realize that they asked you a question and you have no idea what they said. You look forward to every day simply because they would be a part of it. It’s damn near magical.

When it’s gone, love is like withdrawal. It even has physical symptoms, your head hurts, you feel nauseous, you feel a weight on your chest, you feel tired and unhappy; I’m surprised there’s no entry on Web MD for a lovectomy, when all or part of someone’s love has been taken from your body. It’s like everything loses life, food loses flavor, colors aren’t as bright, smells aren’t as good. And that’s not poetic, it’s real. I took a break from someone I cared about and it was rainy and gray every day after, cafeteria food was flavorless, which is the norm, but it seemed a lot less tolerable when I was unhappy, and I felt like I was just going through the motions of every day. And don’t get me started on music. You don’t notice how many love songs are on your iPod until you’re trying not to hear one. And every break up song has more meaning, try listening to “Unbreak My Heart” by Toni Braxton, or “I Need You Bad” by Jazmine Sullivan. Now every word is your life story and every chorus is coming straight from your mind.

All of a sudden he or she was the best; the smartest, the funniest, and you will never find another person like them again. So you sit there cycling between depression and anger until you step back and realize how ridiculous it all is. Think about it. Was this person really as faultless as Jesus when you were with them? Or are you idolizing them now that their gone? I’m guessing the latter. And sometimes it wasn’t working for you, but you had invested so much of your heart into it that you didn’t even notice. How do you know when that’s the case? Look at your outgoing calls and texts to that person… now look at the incoming from that person… if it’s pretty heavy on your side; you’re the only one invested. When’s the last time you hung out with them and the sun wasn’t down?  If time has gone by without communication who usually contacts who first? I don’t have to tell you what answers mean what. When you give 100% and that person is giving 50 or less, it’s not going to work, and obviously the relationship wasn’t working for one or both of you if it fell apart.

But is this love? You feel high and wonderful and great, and then you feel awful? Why is there no consistency? As far as I know, love feels like a life sentence in Gitmo… except you alternate between spa treatments and water boarding.

Dueces! OR How to Break Up in Two Paragraphs and a Sound Track!!!

What’s the best way to break up with someone? I mean, you spend all of this time mentally preparing yourself to cut this person out of your life and then you get to the big moment, when you actually have to tell them you don’t want to know them anymore and… nothing. What words would convey the idea? There’s the always popular “Kick rocks, DUECES!!!” but that’s if it ended badly. What if you just need to move on and it’s not them, it’s you? That’s cliché at this point, so it would sound horrible to say it, but it’s the truth, it really is you and not them. Should you be direct? “It’s not working, it’s over.” Indirect? “See, I think it would be a wonderful idea for both of us if we slowly began to see less and less of each other until we didn’t have a relationship at all…” Professional? “To Whom it May Concern: I think of myself as a company and I’m downsizing, I apologize, but you’ve been terminated.” Intellectual? “It seems our mutual interaction with each other has reached an impasse and has become stagnant, it would be in the best interest of both parties to dissipate the existing arrangement.” How exactly can you do it without hurting the other person? My personal favorite is the compliment sandwich. The compliment sandwich is where you compliment the person, criticize them or deliver bad news, and then finish with a compliment. For example, “I love that sweater on you, but I can’t go out with you any more… you’re still a great person though!”. Nah… that doesn’t really convey the message… Maybe you just have to say exactly what you’re feeling and put everything openly and honestly on the table. Then they can understand everything and have closure, be alright with everything ending.

Now that you have the substance what about the delivery? Definitely not a text message, that’s just awful. End a relationship with someone in 160 characters (on a blackberry), GO. NOT THE MOVE EVER. Facebook and Twitter… are you kidding me? Twitter: So I’m leaving you and our #relationship is over, it's just not workin, no hard feelings but I'm unfollowing you too... #dueces #itsbeencool ß exactly 140 characters… AWFUL. And Facebook, there’s always that awkward moment when So and So is now single comes up… and the other person didn’t know. What about a letter? I mean written sentiment does come from the heart… but it still feels impersonal, as if you couldn’t look at the person to say what you needed to say. This is the move if the person has the ability to talking you out of leaving and you need to make a clean break. A phone call is the move if you can stand to hear the person’s unhappiness but couldn’t look in their face. The best way would have to be a face to face conversation, you know, you say what you have to, they say what they have to and then you make the final decision.

Break up sound track for inspiration! Here are songs that all say the same thing in different ways: IT’S OVER!

1.      Dueces- Chris Brown (of course)

2.      Yahh Trick Yahh- Soulja Boy

3.      Already Gone- Kelly Clarkson

4.      Loving You No More- Diddy & Dirty Money ft. Drake

5.      Going Under- Evanescence

6.      Kitty Kat- Beyonce (for girls lol)

7.      Green Light- Beyonce

8.      It Ends Tonight- All-American Rejects

9.      In Love With Another Man- Jazmine Sullivan

10.  Blame It On Me- Chrisette Michele

11.  Pretty Wings- Maxwell

12.  Take A Bow- Rihanna

13.  Irreplaceable- Beyonce

Google: Define Infatuation

So I'm going to try and blog twice a week, sometimes I'll throw poems in here for creative feedback, but yeah it's all going to be the random things that pop into my head, hence the name of my blog, it's loosely based on the interpretation of dreams by Freud, which is more interesting than it sounds... to me at least, I love psych, but that’s another point...

This may seem sad but I actually had to Google an emotion, as in I went over to my Google toolbar and typed in define infatuation. Needless to say, Google had gotten this request so many times that I only needed to get to define infa- before it came up. About .06 seconds later (according to Google) I got this:

 Web Definition:

1.    a foolish and usually extravagant passion or love or admiration

2.      An unreasoning love or attraction

3.      marked by foolish or unreasoning fondness

You get the gist; basically it’s described as the intense feeling of being stupid because of liking someone.  This does make sense, you’re stuck in that limbo of I know I don’t love you, but there is something there that I can’t get past, and yet it’s nothing that I’m inclined to explore. It’s neither here nor there, and there’s a lot of sure, I mean I guess, but not really going on in your mind. I can tell you from experience, it’s really irritating. It’s the lukewarm grey area between love and like. And yet…I would say foolish, unreasoning, and extravagant may be a little harsh. This feeling has to be based on some aspect of the person that attracted you so it’s not unreasoning, you’re not making any grand gestures of expression so it’s not extravagant, and you usually give a lot of thought to someone you’re infatuated with so it’s hardly foolish. Maybe these definitions were written by people who hated being infatuated with someone. They want black or white, hot or cold, love, but that’s not for everyone. Sometimes you just want an object of affection to think about when bored, or someone to dote on without all of the strings. In reality, infatuation isn’t such an awful thing.

T-Rae’s definition of infatuation:

1.    An intense mix of lust and like that engages the heart but does not tax the mind and is both reasonable and well thought out.

Girl Talk and Guy talk

I was talking to one of my female friends the other day and we were discussing the fact that a guy she had met earlier hadn't texted her. It wasn't that she was competely distraught, but she was concerned about his possible lack of interest. I, of course, immediately went into consolation mode. "He was probably really busy, or his phone was off, or...broken! That's it his phone broke, it must have, because he DEFINITELY would've talked to you if everything was fine!" At first she nodded, and then a male friend, who had been correcting the grammar mistakes on a note that was posted by the RA, jumped in and said that we were such girls. That there are plenty of logical reasons why he didn't text her that didn't include technological malfunction. I was stuck on the fact that he labeled our conversation as girly. Is the way that girls communicate with each other really that different from guys? When giving advice, is an emotional versus a logical response gender defined? I think it depends less on the gender of those involved and more on the immediate needs of the listener. She wasn't looking for a logical straightforward reason as to why he hadn't kept in touch, she was looking for an affirmation, or at least speculation, that he found her engaging. If it were two guys in the situation what would happen? I'm guessing the phrase, "on to the next one", might come up...