Tom's Love Quest

Dear [Joel],

Yes, [Emmy] and I have spent more time together lately. She’s living in Pittsburgh now — one of my old stomping grounds, and I’m helping her learn the area and will assist her in finding a job when she’s ready. Our relationship has not changed since yours and my talk at the camp pool last summer. I feel great compassion for [Emmy] and want to see her succeed. After all, she didn’t get a fair shake at life as a foster child, and I hope to help nullify that disadvantage, and to ensure that she starts her adult life with what she needs to succeed.

However, compassion is not the same as romantic love, and unlike romantic love, it leaves me wanting. Oh, this giving sort of love can result from romantic love, yes, or more generally, it may accompany true love. But kindness, in and of itself, is not love.  [Emmy] and I have a wonderful friendship, but though I care for her, I’m still not   in love   with her. I’ve prayed to Cupid to hit me with his arrow, because I know [Emmy] is a woman of impeccable character, and I am blessed to have enjoyed her affections for so long. Unfortunately [...], I’m still waiting to be pierced. In the meantime, I’m [...] read[ing] as many books as I can on this, listen[ing] to people talk about their own relationships, and watch[ing] movies and TV in the hopes of finding answers. I don’t want to believe that the lastingly passionate love I seek is impossible. But the more I read, listen, and consider my [...] experiences, the more inescapable that conclusion is.

Yet I’ve interviewed couples who’ve been together for decades and who insist that they’ve achieved mutual and lasting passion. And that’s not just talk either, for they watch each other with such unmistakable adoration, that I start wondering how I could have ever doubted the attainability of forever-in-love. Such couples are rare indeed, but they’re definitely out there and I want to be a part of a couple like that.

So, I’ll just keep searching, waiting, thinking, and hoping. And if the answer never comes, well then, maybe I’ll just document the dilemma in my autobiography [...], as others before me have done. Not a particularly original theme. But accounting for my grappling has been exceedingly therapeutic. So if nothing else, this work helps me feel better about being alone.

Tom Hesley

This entry was posted on Friday, February 2nd, 2007 at 5:23 am and is filed under Aloneness, Emmy, Pity, Special Ladies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.