We�ve got 10 million authors with their opinions, but if everyone could get a publishing deal, we�d have over 3 billion books of other opinion. Passion is flavored to only the experiences you�ve had, which is why, considering everyone is unique, there�s not a snowflake-statistic of similarity in any venture as to what could make you sweat and stammer when you have to dial one more digit on the person�s number to talk to them. The things we do for love, indeed.
And some people don�t believe in it, and I�ve been jaded, embarrassed, and humbled enough times to realize that it very much DOES exist. It just doesn�t taste as saccharine-sweet as we want it to, because it�s really not Walt Disney�s animations or a dozen red roses. Hell, some people don�t even like roses at all (give me a good book or song any day).
So why go for it at all? Is Johnny Suave doing the right thing by having sex upon sex upon sexual encounter and telling others about it the next day? Maybe even just writing it down? Because the idea of sex without love, or let�s get less away from the Bible-belt and just suggest that the idea of LIFE without love, is such a godforsaken possibility. See, love�s attributes are hindered and heightened by the modern world. Some people find love in a person that is terrible to them. Other people find that modern technology does nothing but aid them in telling someone else they love them; the anonymity of a chat room or just a plain email. I don�t know if I�d be better off stuck in the age of when you actually had to wet a quill and write an elegant note, or just drink three quarts of coffee and type a poem and print it, send it even just by e-mail.
What�s an unusual grace of love is that it�s tough to dilute it. Love can�t really be digitized. An �I love you� in an e-mail sounds the same to me over the phone, hand-written, said in person. Passion shape-shifts, takes forms, and either you�re having sex and calling it passion or writing love poems and calling it passion, or you�re writing poems about having sex and calling it passion. Passionate sex? Ever been passionately angry? Makes sense.
Some people shy away from the notion (opportunity?) of passion like shadows from light because it requires things of you that make you nervous to give; mainly, yourself. You�ve got to sacrifice, to give give give, and sometimes people just don�t want to do that. There�s nothing WRONG with that, but I�ve written apology notes to love poems and gotten everything from tears to anger to lust in what is an ongoing, evolving romp through emotion�s capacities to harm, to heal.
I don�t regret anything. I�ve had some bad girlfriends and I don�t regret that, either. It�s not a system of weights and measurements, of trade or exchange. �Well, I had about 2 months of misery with Girl X, but later, I had 2 months of pure joy with Girl Y. So I think I�m breaking even.� No. No, not quite. Even if you lose, as cheap as it sounds, you win. Because other people are sitting at home watching TV, playing solitaire, looking out a window with a whole set of emotions untapped and unknown.
I don�t think there exists a single person who cannot love or experience passion of some sort. Why would you shy away from it? Well, a host of reasons. It�s not that hard when you think about it. You; don�t you have one bad experience in love or passion? Would you give that memory enough strength to deter you from ever trying again? How many times have you broken up and vowed never to love again? Congratulations! You�ll most likely fall in love again weather you want to or not! Try to resist it, seal yourself up like a time-proof ration of selfishness, and expect to choke to death on your own fruitless ambition. If it was considered normal to seal yourself off from the world because someone else hurt you once, you might as well kill yourself the first time someone pushes you on the playground.
It�s hard not to be afraid, and I can�t generalize the outcome of the proverbial �happy ending� in some gushing, homogenized Chicken Soup For The X rant about how great love is when it finally happens, blah etc. I�ve had my own private rewards and most likely some of you have, too. You keep those. You can choose to isolate your experiences. I�ve placed paramount the memories of connection, of kissing someone and feeling something other than two pairs of lips touching, and even these slices of my OWN memory might differ vastly from yours, or even what you call passion, either. That�s the point. When someone tells me they have or have not been in love before, I have no choice but to trust whatever they say. It just gets to me when people say �I think so. I�m not sure�. Passion, when it comes or goes, is at least successful at one thing: letting you know. Some people die from it, others live, etc, but it�s not exactly well-versed in subtlety.
Why such negative implications for people that allow this sort of thing, though, to fluctuate from themselves? �Lovesick�? �Lovefool�, �hopeless romantic�. Perhaps it�s because it�s not full of rewards, medals, applause. I�d never trade a tear I�ve shed over someone for a kiss from them instead (in retrospect, of course). It blinds you sometimes when with you, but later on, you find it�s polished and honed your vision.
I write this for no reason at all but that I started thinking about a few people in my life and the different ways they�ve handled passion in ways that could also be handled a million different other ways. None are particularly right or wrong; all are beautiful in some ways, ugly in others. But the only truly negative outcome is if they never let themselves experience it at all.