I'm pretty happy about how things have been going for me lately as far as my friendships and relationships have been going. I finally got to watch Spider-Man 2 with Grace.
Now, you see, I believe that having been Grace's best friend and boyfriend for the past four and a half years, I knew her anyone better than anyone else, and as such, sensible though the advice may have been that I shouldn't tell her about what transpired during my dinner date with Sacha, I decided to be candid about it with her all the same. Naturally, she felt a bit jealous of Sacha, but I think she realized in the end that I, initially and for the most part, simply want to be there for Sach. Not much else, really, barring the seven-year thing we've talked about incessantly.
As I always tend to tell Grace, I'll cross the bridge when I get there.
We had this funny dialogue over the film, though... needless to say, she liked the sequel a lot more than the first film. In any case, we were watching Spiderman during the whole scene at the train, where he used some webs to steer him across the cars, while he was flat on his back...
Marcelle: That's cool!
Grace: Isn't that painful?
Marcelle: Sure! But he's Spiderman!
A little while later, we see Spiderman making webs to catch guys who were being tossed off the train...
Marcelle: How does he make sure about whether or not a web is just going straight or expands like that?
Grace: But of course! He's Spiderman!
I got pwn3d there. But it's okay. I'm Spiderman... well, not really.
I'm just glad she enjoyed the movie. I really am glad that I managed to get some of my emotional baggage out of the way, and truth be told, I think that as far as keeping the faith when it comes to one another, it'd be the least thing we'd be worried about, really. Grace's understanding and outright maturity in the face of my hand-wringing and griping from time to time makes me realize how well we have managed to complement one another over the years.
This seems to be in line with how I once wrote about Grace, which further tells me why I write little about her. There are so many things that are already given when it comes to me and her that there really aren't too many new things to talk about. We've more or less hit a comfort zone quite like most long-term relationships already. This is not to say that this is it for keeps, but bah Gawd, you have to admit that it's pretty ruddy close to that already.
I realize that I don't seem to write about my girlfriend as often as people expect someone who's been with her for five years to. It's as though I'm asked to make it a focal point that “hey, look, Marcelle's taken!”, as though the way I ought to define myself is solely by how I have been dealing with Grace.
But you see, I'm sure Grace wouldn't appreciate being defined as “Marcelle's girlfriend” as though she were some piece of property whose existence is dependent on the acknowledgment of her relationship with me. Neither do I feel comfort in feeling that I have to be compelled to write about her when there simply is nothing to particularly compelling to write about. Some would say that in my eschewing from writing much about her, I deny her recognition, but others who know better realize that it simply goes without saying. I don't have to overtly display my affection for Grace to prove that I love her. I don't have to call and text her every single minute to remind her how much I care about her. We see lots of couples who are so giddy in front of one another. Couples who make us squirm and mutter under our breath that they ought to “get a room”. Not to downplay their sweetness and all, but was their display ever a guarantee that they would last? I didn't think so, either.
It is quite clear that in doing what I do, I don't want to be defined by the relationship. Rather, I want Grace and I to be the ones to define the relationship. Inasmuch as being “best friends” with someone could at times be relegated to proximity, so is loving someone, when the need to be defined by the relationship arises. Why limit one's self to being defined by a relationship when a clearly better alternative stands in the first place? This explains my recent departure from fixation with titles, as I have simply stopped obliging people to call me their “best friend” if they do believe me to be such. It's an exercise of constriction that is slowly but silently corrupting the very essence of what a particular kind of relationship ought to be. Besides, such titles of “my love”, or “my best friend” hold no guarantees if the person who bequeathes these words simply has no sense of commitment. Oh, yes, one can love, but can he really be committed? However, commitment is not my topic of the day, and as such, I shall save that discussion for some other time.
I'm hardly the most romantic person in the world. Just about anyone who's known me before I got together with Grace can tell you that. I'm not being jaded or cynical about love because if I were, then what the Hades am I doing still in this relationship? However, I am a realist, and in being one, I cannot fool myself to live in a dream world, telling myself that love will pay the bills, and love will make me go and move beyond everything. Love is beyond a mere feeling, contrary to what The Darkness might believe. It's not just about the highs and lows of it, the “oh, we are so happy” bits of our relationships and the “oh, I need someone to hold me right now” moments conversely.
Like any long-term relationship (Hopefully it ought to be long term...), love is going to find more plateaus than peaks or valleys, and these plateaus are exceedingly important in making or breaking a relationship. When “nothing much” becomes the order of the day, is love simply going to fade away? It's not always going to be a honeymoon, nor a Pierre the French fighter pilot kind of a picnic, nor is it always going to be gloom and doom. When the non-happening moments come, they will be more crucial to the longevity (or lack of it) of a relationship in that chances are, there will be more plateaus, anyways.
The fact of the matter is, we cannot possibly ignore that people seem to miss the point about getting into a relationship and define it as a case of loving someone because they need that someone. Rather, loving is the cause for needing. And even then, it becomes ridiculously clear that either person is well capable of living without the other, yet at the end of the day, they don't choose to say that they love anyone except that single person whom they decided to love.
What is one's motivation for love, anyway? To make one look like “the man”, in the case of the trophy girlfriend? Plain companionship, which relegates your partner to being a dog? Intellectual discourse, which relegates your partner to being an encyclopedia? Charity, which relegates your partner to be some kind of an institution? Lust, which relegates your partner to a... let's not go there. When one looks at one's motivation for love and sees any answer that's remotely dubious, then it's high time to question if this love is genuine to begin with.
Why love, anyway? Some (Like those who just loooove quoting that Mr. Callassanz urban legend.) would ask back, “why not?” But there are a million and one reasons for a person to not love another. Maybe there's no attraction. Maybe there's no chemistry. Maybe one is not comfortable with being treated like a god or a goddess and being worshiped all the time. Maybe one wishes to fulfill something they see to be far more worthwhile than loving another in a romantic sense. Maybe one feels the time is not yet right. Does that mean that if one can successfully answer the question “why not”, then the motivation for love disappears? Of course not! If it did, then it's quite hard to understand how couples who fell in love over one another's looks still continue loving one another when all that external beauty has gone. If it did, then Nancy Reagan would've had no reason to stay strong for her late husband who completely forgot who she is every now and then.
Ergo, and I know I've said this a million times already, the answer is not “why not”. Perhaps, the better answer would be: Why ask why?
Why do I love? Why ask why? I love because love is my motivation. I am blessed with a wonderful human being, among a myriad of wonderful human beings who touched my life, and yet I chose her because I chose her. Perhaps I never even chose to love her, but love chose me to be with her. Would it be forever? That's irrelevant to the point. Is it logically, rationally correct? Love moves beyond the realms of logic and rationality. If I could give a good reason why, then the negation of this good reason why I should love Grace will simply tear me away from her. I love her because I love her. It is for its own sake, and not for that of another. Is it the perfect answer? I cannot guarantee it. Is it right? It feels right. What if I'm wrong? Then I live and learn.
And so, with nothing but the certainty of uncertainty to guide me, why do I love? Why ask why? Why ask why, save for the fact that in asking yourself why, you discover for yourself that there really is no reason to ask why?
In love, no matter how grizzled, no matter how uninitiated one may be, there will always, and I sure as Hades mean, always be a method to the madness. Ask not why. For the answers speak for themselves. I love Grace because I choose to love Grace. Why do I choose to? Because that power is what inextricably makes me and the one whom I choose to love, very much human. As a human being, I am far from perfect, but the consolation is, I know that I can be so much more. I realize the same thing follows for her. In the final analysis, after all has been said and done, that unfolding of being that happens in this kind of relationship is simply something no amount of rationalizing or analysis could possibly make heads and tails out of.
Why I do what I do is justified because I do it for the sake of doing it. As such, I bask in this small truth's consolation: that while very little is sure in this world, I am sure that I am making a choice, wrong or right as the case may be, for the right reasons.
Think about it, jabronis.
No comments:
Post a Comment