The Many Meanings of Love (Part One)

I am dreaming Dear of you, 
Day by day
Dreaming when the skies are blue, 
When they're gray;
When the silv'ry moonlight gleams, 
Still I wander on in dreams,
In a land of love, it seems, Just with you.

Let me call you "Sweetheart," I'm in love with you.
Let me hear you whisper that you love me too.
Keep the love-light glowing in your eyes so true.
Let me call you "Sweetheart," I'm in love with you.

Longing for you all the while, 
More and more;
Longing for the sunny smile, 
I adore;
Birds are singing far and near, 
Roses blooming ev'rywhere
You, alone, my heart can cheer; You, just you.

Let me call you "Sweetheart," I'm in love with you.
Let me hear you whisper that you love me too.
Keep the love-light glowing in your eyes so true.
Let me call you "Sweetheart," I'm in love with you.

-Let Me Call You Sweetheart (1910)

Such a lovely song. I was doing some reading on old music (something I happen to adore), and I stumbled across this one. It wasn't the first time I had heard it; I had grown up watching Barney's Great Adventure, where the kid's grandfather sings an incredibly sweet a capella cover to their grandmother as she watches on adoringly.

A childish example of love, I suppose. But what it must be like to possess such a steadfast love, to last oh so many years! We yearn for it, we fight for it. But few these days ever find it. Why? I have often asked myself this question.

I was raised at home. Yes, I was homeschooled. My interpretation of the outside world is very different than most other people's because of how I learned and because of the different experiences I had. To pass the time when I was a child, I read books, and a lot of them. And it never stopped as I got older; in fact, I spent a great deal of time pouring through stacks of books that I would cart home from the local library every week.

My favorite genre was and is Historical Fiction. I would be willing to bet that over half of the books I have read in my lifetime have been Historical Fiction, so much of a love I had for those stories. I would become giddy reading about the lives of others living in eras that I could only dream of. I envied them, wishing I could join them and leave this world that I felt so out of place in. So many stories did I absorb and ponder that I found myself beginning to think the way they did. I had such a simple view of the world, one that I was surprised to discover could be applied to even today's ever changing world. One view that I developed from these books is the concept of Love, and what it really means.

Such a claim, one might say. No one knows what Love is, and I can definitely agree with that; I can't say I fully understand it. But I do know that Love is not to be trifled with. It is a serious thing, a happy thing. But there are certain guidelines and rules to love that I think that the world has forgotten, thus ruining their chances of finding that one thing everyone searches, in one way or another, their whole lives for.

In the song Let Me Call You Sweetheart, there is a special sort of simple whimsy about it. No strings, no notes of hardship, nothing to suggest that Love could ever even hurt, not even a promise of a wedding. All that it is, is a simple and sweet declaration of Love. And that's it. But such strength is hidden behind it! This person is bearing their heart to the one they love without any sort of fear. They are saying, I love you, and I am not afraid to say so because I love you.

Why is it, then, that today the concept or subject of Love is met with so much hesitation and fear? Why is it that less and less people are getting married, more and more people are divorcing, fewer people even want to fall in Love at all, and sacrificing for Love has become the endeavor of fools? Such a sad world it is when the driving force of mankind, something that we cannot help, is now met with so much scrutiny. I believe a lot of it has to do with fear, selfishness, and complicated lives. I will attempt to explain my viewpoint in the best manner I can; in order to do this, I feel that I will have to do this in two different posts, just to make sure I don't write something that is entirely too long.

1.) Selfishness
In today's society, it is encouraged for a person to look after Number One. Society says "Marriage? What is this, the 1920's?! You have your whole life ahead of you to be married! Drink! Party! And by golly, go to school and have a career! That's the only way you'll ever be happy; you don't wanna tie yourself down too soon, do you?"

People have allowed society to decide what is best for us. I mean, come on. How do they know what is going to make me happiest? Really, I believe it has more to do with what the upper 1% want for us; more money is made by people with careers than people with families, but that's another story. They have this picture perfect idea that appeals to a great deal of people. You get to have your cake and eat it too, so to speak. You can have your time to indulge in your little fantasies without any sort of regret, and later, after you've had your fun, THEN you can have a family, if you choose to have one, that is. If you don't follow this formula for a picture perfect life? Well, then you're some kind of nutjob that's going to end up flipping burgers at McDonalds, or, my personal favorite that's used on women on a regular basis, you'll end up dependent on a man for the rest of your life.

Now, correct me if I'm wrong... but isn't that the point of marriage? To be able to depend on someone for the rest of your life? And I am not just talking about women here, I am talking about men too. People need people, in some way, shape or form. The idea of being married is creating a union, that is, two people becoming a single unit, becoming one, if you will. A successful marriage depends on being needed, being nurtured, feeling safe, and depending on each other equally emotionally. Like I said, people need people. And marriage means you are with the person you need the most on this earth, to help you through the crap life has to throw at you. So that means that yes, a woman should be dependent on a man at some point, but only if he is equally as dependent on her.

But I don't see this happening. What I do see is this mindset in a lot of people, "How can I benefit from this?" For a lot of people, a major factor in the relationship is sexual attraction. We find each other sexy? Sweet! Let's go out! They get to know each other, maybe go out on a few dates, and then they sleep together. At this point, a lot of these mock "unions" break up and are never heard about again.

Sometimes they last and they stay together. They get into this phase where everything the other one does is cute, no matter how annoying it may be (anyone know "That Couple" that you just can't stand to be around because you can feel cavities starting to form in your teeth from all the mushy, lovey sweetness in the air?). They stay together a few years, and they find key points in the other's personality that they actually really like, and manage not to kill each other. So, they get married.

Problem is, at this point they learn what it really means to "honor and obey", and they really don't like it very much. She doesn't like his best friend or his buddies, he hates her "bestie" with a bloody passion and thinks she's the most annoying female on the planet, she hates when he goes to the bar, he hates it when she goes and gets another mani/pedi with her "gal pals" at the mall, and a whole lot of other things that they never really noticed before. They start to fight with each other. He may sleep out on the couch for the first time within the first two years. They give each other the cold shoulder for a day or two. Then they kiss, they make up, they have some amazing make up sex, and then they are fine for a while. But because of the circumstances the union started on, it is just the end of a never ending, viscous cycle that often ends in a bitter divorce.

Now, that is not to say that all marriages are like this; I have seen a few successful marriages that were formed in the aftermath of a one night stand. Every couple is different, so the success rates are different. But a lot of modern couples in their thirties tend to do this; you see it in the media all the time. Movies, TV shows, music, ect. All of it paints this picture that screams "Marriage sucks".

But what is the root of all of this selfishness that drives the modern individual? Why do men and women have such a hard time understanding one another, and why do so many marriages fail that could easily be fixed if this selfishness were to be absent? That leads me to my next contributing factor in the demise of the modern marriage-

2.) Fear


But, that is enough for now. I shall leave you, my readers, to digest these theories, and I shall post the next part of my little rant within the week, I promise.