Let's Talk About Love - 51 Years Of Wedded...Something.

I've been thinking a lot about love lately.

I think it is one of the things that almost every human being wants, yet for some people it is an extremely rare commodity.  Love can be as hard to find as a pure breath of fresh air in the middle of Los Angeles, California. 

Although, I suppose that my mom and dad could be the exception to the rule.

Above is a picture of the two of them on their wedding day.  August 28, 1965.  As of August 28, 2016, they are still very much married, which makes this anniversary their fifty-first.  And, 51 years later, three kids, and four grandkids later, they've come to the conclusion that they are really meant to be.

There have been times in which their marriage has been like that Captain and Tennille song "Love Will Keep Us Together".  Similarly, there have also been times in which their marriage has been like that Def Leppard song "Love Bites".  I suppose that is true with every marriage though.  You have your ups and you have your downs.  Some days you want to spend every single day together and the next you want to mail each other to Abu Dhabi the same way that Garfield always tries to do with Nermal.

So, how is it that my parents have stuck it out for 51 years of wedded...something, while so many people have difficulty making it to the 5.1 year mark?  I honestly wish I had an answer for that, but the truth is that I simply don't.

I suppose part of the reason is that I don't quite understand the concept of everlasting love myself.

I mean, I do know what love is as far as what the meaning is.  I have love for my family.  I have love for my friends.  I have love for those white chocolate macadamia nut cookies that the bakery at my store sells.  Those things are almost considered an addiction for me!

And I definitely know the difference between love and lust.  For one, love is something that is good and wonderful while lust is symbolic for being evil and twisted.  I mean, lust is one of the seven deadly sins, after all.

And besides that, if lust were a person, I'd picture them as being a horndog football player with the IQ of a tsetse fly who is only interested in doing a little play by play behind the bleachers of the school football field.  Or, they'd be the head cheerleader whose skirts are about as short as her attention span that would be the very kind of girl that our lustful halfback would chase after.  Lovely imagery there, right?

No, I'm talking about that moment where you lock eyes on another person and you just know that you're destined to spend your whole life with them.  Where I would look at a girl and this song would be playing in my head...

...and where she'd look back at me, and this song would be playing in her head...

...and we'd all live happily ever after in our Motown kind of life.

I haven't had one of those moments yet...at least not one that has stuck.  I mean, there have been instances in which I have developed crushes on people and I thought that I would have a shot at love with them...but somehow I think both Alyssa Milano and Kylie Minogue are taken, so those hopes were immediately dashed.

I've also had moments in which I have experienced unrequited love.  In that I've had feelings for a girl and she's told me that she doesn't date fat people.  First of all, ouch.  And secondly, chocolate chip cookies that you dip in a tub of Cool Whip had more of a personality than her anyway, so it's really her loss!

I've also had moments in which feelings of love have dissolved into feelings of friendship - which I don't mind too much.  Though, given that many of my friends are female, I think I might be doing TOO good a job with that.

But real love...that's the part that I just can't figure out how to find. 

It certainly doesn't help when people constantly tell me that I need to get out more and put myself out there.  For one, these are people who have already found their happily ever after stories, and honestly I think that they need to focus more on that instead of trying to be the latest spokespeople for eHarmony.  And for another, I classify myself as an introvert who communicates a lot better through pen and paper rather than face to face.  Which would be fine if I wanted to date Siri, but let's face it.  She's impersonal, she doesn't always give you what you want for an answer, and she'll make you feel bad if you use salty language in front of her.  Definitely not worth it.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that at this point in time, I've made peace with the fact that if I am meant to be in a relationship with someone else, it will happen.  And if it's not meant to be, it's something that I can accept.  Not everybody needs to have someone else to complete them.  If anything, I don't see true love as being a responsibility where two people act as puzzle pieces, join together, and that's the end of it.  Rather, I see a successful relationship as being two different coloured crayons.  Together, they blend the most beautiful shade that represents the very best parts of themselves.  They then take that colour and beautify everything else around them to create a loving network of beauty and wonder.

And, yeah, I know that sounded extremely cheesy, but that's the sentence that came out of my Velveeta brain today.  You're just going to have to roll with it.

At this point in time, unless I get married tomorrow and live to be 86 years old, I'm probably not going to see a 51st wedding anniversary in my lifetime.  I may not even see a 1st wedding anniversary.  But again, I have to keep telling myself that if it is going to happen, it will.

Until then, it's celebrating those who have found true love and made it work.  Like my parents.

Happy 51st anniversary, you crazy kids!