Sitting here drinking my coffee, waiting for my dudes (boyfriend and dog - though I've already walked the dog) to wake up so I can make some breakfast and I started thinking about how weird certain things in life are.
Mostly love.
On a very basic level, we choose someone who best suits our life or our personality or our interests or we choose someone who catches our eye aesthetically and we decide this person should always be around us. We decide we love them and we start to share stuff; our food, our stories, our secrets, our bed, our lives and everything in the world is comfortable.
How did this come about? How did love happen?
For me, love and dating has always been rooted in some sort of fear. I think on some level it's like that for a lot of people. When you start dating someone new, it's a wee bit terrifying. I don't know why. Perhaps I'm just a human riddled with anxiety.
I'm definitely a human riddled with anxiety.
But whenever I'd be propositioned for a proper date, my stomach would drop and my skin would tingle with nervousness and anxiety. So much so that it didn't even feel like a healthy amount, so I would avoid dating at all costs. In fact, I felt that very feeling as I was sitting here writing this.
As I've said in the past, I'm what's become known as a "serial monogamist". I don't date unless it's going to be a long term relationship and I don't date around in the meantime.
But more than my own past anxieties, I've been thinking - with no real endgame - about why and how we as human beings fall in love.
I started dating my live-in boyfriend in early March of 2015. And I keep thinking back to what drew me to him. He's a pretty charismatic guy, chatty, smart, funny, sweet... and I think that's it for me. If you have a bitchin personality, I'm sold.
But what made me fall in love? I don't know. And maybe we never really know. Maybe we aren't meant to know. But I know that I love my boyfriend. I know why I love him now. But is it an insatiable self-serving urge that we realize we love someone?
"I feel like I can't live without this person, so I love them"
or
"This person likes me, so I love them"
I'm not saying this was at all the case for me, but it could be for some people in this very narcissistic world that we live in. I will, however, love anyone who likes me even a little bit. Hope you like Edible Arrangements.
In the same vein, I've been thinking about marriage and social norms a lot lately as well. Do I want to get married? Do I REALLY want to get married? Why? Because society has made it a thing for decades upon decades upon decades? Because if one of us gets in a horrendous car accident, we'll be able to be in the hospital room to hold the other's hand?
I'm okay with the concept of marriage. There's nothing wrong or subservient about committing your life to someone else. I think it's a really nice idea actually. Granted, in this day and age marriage doesn't really mean anything. And I'm a firm believer in living together before you get married.
If you don't, you will learn all the annoying shit about each other right after you get married and then blame it on the fact that "marriage is hard". That's why people say marriage is hard. Living with someone for years and evolving as a couple over time is no different than getting married and subsequently living with them for years and evolving as a couple. The only difference is in the second instance, you're married, so you can blame it on that.
Is it defiant of me to question the social norm of marriage, but still want to get married? Probably. I think there's a small hipster traditionalist in me that really does want to get married. But at a courthouse. Just us and our parents/siblings. Then a party with all our family and friends. That's it. That sounds like my dream wedding.
I've gone off the rails a bit here, but I'm apparently having an existential crisis today.
Oh, I've also figured out what I want to do with my life.
