THE STRANGENESS OF LOVE, a newspaper coloumn by Robert.I am almost certainly not in the minority when it comes to that fickle phenomenon called love. Poets and writers have from the beginning of time tried to explain what it feels like to love, to be in love, or to carry the bones of a destroyed love.
Men have acted peculiarly where women have been concerned since way back. When a man loves a woman with all his heart, reason, rationality and common sense take the back seat.
Consider Marc Anthony's love for Cleopatra. He abdicated the Roman throne to join her in Egypt, and in a subsequent war over the event both died. Then, of course, one must think about the Trojan wars, which commenced after the kidnapping of the beautiful Helen of Troy. More recently, King Edward abdicated his throne to scandalously marry the American divorcee Wallace Simpson.
What force on earth makes a man do these things ? All men involved are reputed to have enjoyed robust mental health. Then why did they cast their lives and/or thrones away for women ? I'll tell you why.
Once a man is stricken, truly stricken with that most nacreous of emotions, love, he is lost. Lost in the sense that the course of his romantic life is forever altered. The finely-balanced needle of his emotional compass is irrevocably shifted. And he will, accordingly, redirect his destiny.
I find myself stricken with love on a horrifyingly regular basis. To be certain, these spells are indeed the love (the love that heedlessly dismisses common sense) that I have detailed above.
And as certainly as the moon will rise, I find myself ground beneath love's high-heeled shoe. Then a brief depression, accompanied by a return to reason and rationality.
"Girls ?" I think during these periods. "Ha ! Who needs 'em." And then, Egad ! Another bronzed babe waltzes into my life, disrupting my career plans and causing me to move to other cities and the like.
This love now. I freely admit that I'll jump through hoops and be compliant and tame and well-behaved during the course of the emotional rollercoaster ride these well-meaning girls take me on. Why not admit it ?
I am not currently in the throes of a relationship right now. If I were, you can bet that if I were a powerful king, and my love was a distant, beautiful princess (or a slave girl--love knows no rules of protocol), I would bend heaven and earth to be with her.
That is not to say I would bring her a man's head on a platter or other such cruel foolishness, only that a trifling thing like abdicating my throne or kidnapping her would be with me the work of a moment.
I'm not really sure where this little essay is going, except to say that I'm acting as an apologist for all of us gents who fall hard for the opposite sex. I personally feel that falling in love is a noble plaudit to the female gender, and the harder one falls, the more sincere the compliment.
A word on love at first sight: it's the real thing, by Jingo. I have fallen in love with girls from one end of the earth to the other in my travels. A well-turned ankle, a husky voice, a skein of silk--damn near anything can trigger these spells of deep, true love, and it can happen after merely a glance at the lucky thing.
If I am rebuffed immediately, then this love will usually wither swiftly. If, however, the object of my adoration gives me even the slightest indication that an enduring relationship is possible, then I react accordingly, not playing the game by the rules at all.
These fellows who "play the game" and the girls who play fast and loose with a good man's love are creatures more to be pitied than censured. Ah, what they are missing ! Romance is where it's at, people. Give your love freely, unabashedly ! Like the man says, Tell 'er you love 'er, dammit ! Abdicate your throne !
This may not be sagacious advice, but I am not a sage. I know, though, that I am at my happiest and most productive when I have a target for my affections. And being happy and productive are the two aims of my life. Actually, just being secure in the knowledge that just around the corner another love awaits is enough to make me happy and productive.
I'm not advocating promiscuity or adultery by this rather exhibitionistic display of journalism. I am, however, advocating personal happiness, and one means of getting that is free of charge and requires only the unbridling of your spirit. It's springtime, by Zeus, so let's all get with the program and fall in love !
--Robert Mount, 1992
