"Maybe no one's ever really loved you..."

A few posts ago, I talked about the love cult - individuals who truly believe that love can conquer all and are mortally wounded when someone does not share their beliefs. They're almost emotional, love-sick fundamentalists, ready to tear down anyone who dares to insult their God - the God of love. These are the same people who told me "Well, you've never really been in love." Fuck you. Yes I have. However, there is a flip-side to the coin, and I will explain it to you without further ado...

This different viewpoint was brought to my attention the other day - what if I have loved and lost, but the other person in the relationship never really loved me? While walking on the boardwalk I was musing over my friend's new relationship - the lengths that the man goes to in order to spend time with his girlfriend boggles my mind. As someone who has constantly gone out of my way to keep my significant other happy, the thought that it was being reciprocated by the man was almost too much for my mind to process. Wait. So you mean, he travels to you? He calls you first? He doesn't give you a hard time at the restaurant when you paid seven dollars short of your half? What on earth are you talking about?

And then, my friend turned to me and said: "It's because a man has never really loved you." The wind was knocked out of me...wow. She's right. All of the work that I put forth - the prepared meals, the travel, the moving across country, the stress - it was all for naught, not returned in kind. Realizing this, my friend quickly amended her statement: "Not yet...but you'll find him."

I don't believe her, but it was a delightful realization nonetheless, and it makes perfect sense. My relationships have always felt like exercises in futility, second and third jobs. I constantly felt like I was in a sinking life raft, and, as I struggled, a maniacal force was continually tearing holes in the already fragile hull. I was never the catalyst in my own break-ups because it was the other person who was never truly invested...they had never loved me in the way that fosters a more permanent union. Granted, I don't believe anything is permanent but there are other types of love that stand a better chance; the type of love that I have yet to experience (and doubt I ever will).

There is also another possibility...I created this atmosphere in my relationships myself. By never requiring my partner to put forth the effort, complacency inevitably resulted. I suppose the platitude "that which is easily won, is done" stands true for all of my relationships. I wish I knew how to be a girl - aloof, ever so bitchy, and just slightly unattainable. Dammit, I have a lot to learn. Tack that on to my desire to play the piano, and I've already created a very full fall season for myself.