In general, I alternate between periods of joy because I’m sure I want to be with E.S. and anxiety because I’m plagued with doubt and uncertainty. I know that the doubt and uncertainty are symptoms of the poison our culture has fed us for a hundred years about how true love means that birds sing in your ear 24 hours a day and that you are constantly so giddy that you’re at risk of taking flight. I know this. And yet the detox is just as difficult as detox always is.
Regular doses of Jane Austen are helping a great deal. She was right about everything else; it’s becoming clear to me that she was right about relationships too. They’re not about Willoughby’s charming good looks or Wickham’s easy manner (or Hugh Grant’s endearing stutter or Gwyneth Paltrow’s breasts). They have to be built on sterner stuff. Like admiration. And respect. Which seem, over time, to be turning into something else.
A friend of mine said yesterday, “You need to stop thinking.” Of course, if I did that, then all my earthly problems would be solved, as well as a great number of my spiritual problems.
I’m trying to accept that doubt and uncertainty are really just a part of life.
The fact that every relationship I’ve ever had in which birds sang in my ear 24 hours a day ended in disaster helps.
So does the fact that the sex is fantastic.
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