A favorite quote I share from my mother is: "How could I have raised such a bitter and jaded child?" This question says more about me than it does about her; what type of 11 year old girl looks her mother in the eyes and tells her she "doesn't believe in romantic love?" The answer to the latter question is that I am. The answer to the first, however, is a bit more complicated.
(I guess this is the part where I try to be serious and I hope I make sense)
I would like to blame circumstance, but how I dealt with circumstance is what has made me who I am-- a cynical 18 year old girl who wore sunglasses to her mother's funeral not because she was crying but because she wasn't.
Every member of my family who has married has been divorced at least once. My grandmother currently holds the record with seven marriages with her ex-husband following in a close second with five (I think he should technically win, because he was a swinger in the 70s so he got laid more.) My life goal, until recently, was to beat grandmother's record. It seemed like fun to live with different people, move to different places, live different lives. I have no problems with divorce--this appalls all of my divorced relatives--and I don't believe in soul mates.
4 weeks since I last gleefully shared my life-plan to a realtive's dismay and I've reformed this goal. I still have no problems with divorce, but I'm not going to avoid the alternative: "one and done." For now I'm going to keep doing whatever I want and no love-of-my-life nonsense is going to stop me--but I also will not let cynicism stop me from developing functional relationships with other people (eh...or I'll try not to let it?) Perhaps there is someone out there that I could get along with better than others, and I'll find him.
A favorite quote I share from my father is: "true love is finding the one person that annoys you the least." I disagree. For me, love ("true love" or whatever B.S.) is finding someone who can make me feel an emotional range greater than that of a tree squirrel. I need to be annoyed. I don't want to be bitterly cold, detached, level-headed Reg for the rest of my life.
Last night I sobbed uncontrollably into my pillow. Am I in "love?" (If I am I suppose I best get over it soon, judging by how poorly it's going.) As I sit here and type this cross-legged on my bedroom floor I feel content as usual, but in the edges of my consciousness are consuming emptiness and a thought that I've lost something dear.
Maybe I should just eat a taco and get over myself (make it with a flour tortilla...oh and carne asada please.)
Your butterfly,
Reg
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