Love...it's exciting and new...

This morning was a great wake-up. To be able to roll over and cuddle up in those final few minutes before climbing out of bed. I have been married to my best friend for almost thirteen years. We've known each other for nineteen years, and even after all this time, there is no one else in the world I want to spend time with as much as I do him? We've been through a lot of difficult times together, and yet even through the toughest of them we managed to come out of them even closer than we were before. That is love.

What got me thinking about love is the interaction between two of the charcters in the current story I am working on. A male cybernetic being is talking to a human woman about love and death. She mentions that her husband died before war broke out, shot by terrorists in the park, and had she not shortly thereafter discovered that she was pregnant, she would have taken her own life. She tells him that now if anything ever happened to her son... if it ever came down to it, she would throw her life down without a second thought to save his. He is perplexed by this, not able to process the notion of love being strong enough to dictate the outcome of one's life, but for some people it really is that strong. Romeo and Juliet... suicidal at the mere thought of one losing the other. Characters in a story, yes, but as Oscar Wilde once said, "Life imitates art fare more than art imitates life."

Love is such a powerful force. Those five words seem limp as three day old lettuce in comparison to the actual power of love. When I sit down and try to imagine what my life might have been with him in it, I seem nothing. No him would mean that the child I have now would never have come into being, and thinking about a life without either of those two people just isn't something I like to do.

The funny thing is, we were destined to be together. I truly believe that. We met at the local mall while I was still in high school. He had only just come back from living in Los Angeles. Being a giggling teenager, I and my friend Liz followed him and his friend Andy around the mall for about an hour before we finally followed them out one of the exits, pretending we were going to our car. He came after us. Being incredibly shy, it was a feat for him that only fate could have pushed. He came over and gave me his phone number and the next day we talked on the phone for six hours before he finally convinced his friend to drive down to see me. That night before he left, he kissed me for the first time and told me that he could already see himself spending the rest of his life with me... like we had known each other for an eternity.

I don't like to think about what my life would be like without having ever met him. There were times in the past when things seemed tough that I thought maybe we both would have been better off had we never met, but I know better now. Life's experiences, the ones that we lay on our deathbed contemplating, it's those types of experiences I want to be thinking about. How I was blessed enough to have loved so deeply, to have been loved so deeply... how that no matter how low I felt because of things I had been through, or how badly I felt about myself, there was someone there for me who couldn't see all of those flaws I thought were fatal. And if he did see them, he could see through them, into the person that I really was, and that was who he loved.

I think about all of the people who never find love... who marry out of loneliness only to find themselves even more miserable than they were when they were alone... who marry because their parents' made a choice for them before they were even old enough to think about their own future, and it makes me very sad. Sure, some of those people fall in love. I am reminded of the scene in Fiddler on the Roof (yes, life imitates art, yet again,) when Tevye comes home and asks Golda, "Do you love me?" It seems an absurd question to her. Their relationship has gone on so long that they no longer thought about love the way the young do, but it was there nonetheless. Despite having an arranged marriage, over time they came to love one another very deeply, but not everyone is so lucky.

So when I think about how lucky I am, I don't gloat, but I do treasure it, and I hope that everyone in the world can experience the kind of love that I have been fortunate enough to know. It makes the world go around. Some days it may seem like money, war, hatred and greed are what spin the globe, but that's what the media would like us to believe. They want us to dwell on the gloom and the sorrow, but there is beauty and wonder out there yet.

There are people who are filled with love and hope, and in the end I feel very strongly that love will triumph over all this darkness. Maybe I've read too many fairy tales, but that's what I believe. The strength and power in love is more powerful than hate, it's just easier to sink into hate when things feel dark.

Love. It's the order of the day.

Oh yeah, and GO STEELERS!

Hancock: A View on Relationships

Last night we sat down to watch the movie Hancock about the superhero gone wrong. I am writing this blog for those who have seen the film already and will probably mention things that may be considered spoilers to those who have not yet seen the film. Consider this fair warning not to read on, but feel free to return after you've seen the movie and let know what you think.

The concept of Gods evolving into angels and then becoming superheroes with the times was a fascinating view on mankind's inability to find the extraordinary amidst his own kind, but what really struck me was the commentary on relationships. This is my own personal interpretation, and not something I read elsewhere so it is riddled with speculation and opinion. I am not claiming that what I am about to discuss was in any way intended as a message by the writer or director of the film.

During the film Hancock becomes associated with a PR man named Ray and his family after saving he saves Ray's life. Upon meeting the Ray's wife, Mary, one gets the impression that Mary is somewhat disgusted by Hancock, and rightly so considering the lifestyle he's led. She warns her husband not to get involved with Hancock, but Ray has plans that he is sure will change the superhero's life and image.

After Hancock begins to turn himself around, he tells Mary and Ray his story. He woke up in a hospital with nothing but a pack of bubble gum and two movie tickets in his pocket. He'd had his skull cracked, and amnesia set in. Later the next day he discovers that Mary knew him at that time. She at first claims that she is his sister, but later she tells the truth. They were paired together. All of the gods were paired when they were born, but when drawn together they become mortal and die. Together they had survived more than three thousand years, and Mary had left him in the hospital that day so he could live.

After a showdown with the movie's bad guys, both Mary and Hancock are mortally wounded in the same hospital and the only way to save their lives is if they are separated. With every ounce of his being, Hancock flees the hospital, bringing Mary back to life and restoring both of their powers. They can only be immortal heroes when they are apart. Only by sacrificing their desire to be together can they function as heroes.

This made me think about how heavily many people in today's society rely on relationships. From the minute teenage girls enter into the fifth grade they are already planning out which boys they want to spend the rest of their lives with. Many graduate high school and enter into relationships immediately. Some wait until they finish college and enter the workforce, but it seems as if everyone is searching for their soulmate all the while.

Once the soulmate is found, many set aside dreams they once had and never pick them up again. They sacrifice their wings, or at least he dreams that once inspired their souls to fly, and sink into relationship mode. Soon there's a wedding, a house, possibly kids, a dog, a white picket fence... but no more dreaming. But what if we knew our soulmate was out there. Like a guarantee on the future we could set out to live our lives to the fullest potential unhindered by the restraints and confinements of love. Through sacrificing that bit of time with our soulmates, we would really find out who we are and what we are capable of becoming. We would get in touch with our true selves. There would be no fear of loneliness because we would entrust the universe to bring us together when the time was right.

Imagine if you managed to fulfill your plans and goals before settling into relationship mode. The wanderer would be quelled, the dreamer fulfilled. Wouldn't that time with our soulmates be all the more satisfying? There would be less divorce, less dissatisfaction with our relationships. In knowing ourselves fully, we would take the time to know our soulmates and there would be no strange surprises.

Maybe that's crazy. I know that I wouldn't give up my soulmate for anything. He's been my rock, my support system and my best friend through many long and difficult trials, but I know even he has wondered what wonders we might have achieved in this world if we had met after we'd had time to pursue the dreams that fueled our souls.

There are others who believe that without their soulmate they could not have gotten to the place they are today, or become the wonder they are now, and maybe that's possible too. Some of us need a boost, a little rocket-fuel to shoot us into the stars, and maybe the rocket fuel comes from the love and support of one's soulmate.

There's no way of knowing. If you've taken one path, you can only speculate what the outcome of the other might have been, but in the film the suggestion seemed to implicate that while they were soulmates, they were more valuable to the world if they were apart and focusing their energy on mending the world and its people.

Probably nonsense, but it was a nice bite of food for thought while I was in the bath tonight.