Ours is one of the only societies in the world in which we marry for love. And even in our own culture, it is only in recent history that the idea of basing long-term commitment on such a fragile, emotional concept seems at all sane.
“All we need is love,” right? Well, in the Middle Ages the French defined love as a “derangement of the mind” and in China, excessive love between husband and wife was seen as a threat to extended families. In Africa, the Fulbe of Cameroon do not see love as a legitimate emotion, especially within marriage. Fulbe women “vehemently deny emotional attachment to a husband,” said Stephanie Coontz, Evergreen State College faculty member and author.
I always believed love was a concept that had a maximum expiration date of seven years. That was it. And don’t ask me why. After seven years this nebulous concept would disintegrate, and people would need to move on. This belief wasn’t simply a stage: It was my entire life of seeing relationship after relationship fail.
If love is just a concept, how does marriage ever last in Western society, I asked.
The question is now closer to home.
After years of disbelief, I have now been faced with having to explain how I can be sure of a long-term commitment to a loved one. Aside from him being the kindest, most intelligent and dynamic person I have ever met, and despite that “deep knowing,” words of explanation have escaped me.
For years and years I have been an observer. OK, a cynic. I observed intently each relationship I saw, scrutinizing why it should or should not exist. Most often, of course, it was the latter. So much I saw through my young, cynical eyes hurt me to the core. I saw people losing themselves and their dreams or caught in repetitive cycles or compromising themselves for the sake of another.
So far this doesn’t sound too positive, right? Well, if someone spends years scrutinizing relationships, she learns what she wants and doesn’t want. She learns to be careful, and about the nature of different forms of love. I have seen very few relationships that made me smile inside and out. But I have observed exactly how such relationships operate and why they exist. And if someone spends years also scrutinizing herself, she knows exactly whether she sees these seeming rarities in her own life.
They say love is blind. I go into this with eyes wide open.
Along with scrutiny came expectation. A long-term relationship to me was certainly not the norm or expectation. I was willing to go an entire lifetime without it. I had always viewed marriage as an outdated and unnecessary legality. My own mother waited 43 years until she found the person she wanted to be with forever.
Again, this doesn’t sound encouraging.
But I ask, do you have any friends who have expectations of the “love and live happily ever after” dream? I’m sure you do. Sometimes they do find “the one.” But most of the time, I’m sure you’ve had to comfort them through various heartbreaks, and your tissue stash is probably low.
“Expectation is the root of all heartache,” William Shakespeare said. Freed of it, decisions can be logical, meditated and rational. I am not in a relationship for the sake of being with someone. I am in it because it is brilliant, challenging, inspiring, supportive and draws me closer each day to my own dreams — dreams that are now shared with a best friend.
Bethany Lowe can be reached at [email protected]