ideals and ideas
Apr. 7th, 2003 10:22 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dchenesMy sister is, at this very moment, in the air somewhere on her way to Paris for a week. If I could have afforded the airfare and taken the time off, I would be going too. I worry a little about her because the reason she wanted me to go is that I speak French and she doesn't. She'll get by, of course.
I've been thinking about the time I spent in France when I was in college, and mostly remembering the things I liked. I'm very fond of the idea that lunch should be a reason to close everything for two hours and enjoy a meal, preferably at home. Lunch here, on the other hand, is something you have exactly an hour to find and inhale on your way back to work, because of course work is more important than anything else in the world. Sigh.
Another thing I envy the Europeans is the idea of going out every day and buying what you're going to eat for that day. I suppose you can do that here too, but when was the last time you stood behind someone in the grocery store who was buying one or two meals' worth of food? People here just don't do that. You go to the grocery store and buy everything in sight so you don't have to go grocery shopping again for three weeks. OK, I exaggerate, but that's the idea.
One of the things I don't miss is the fact that nobody in France curbs their dogs, so you have to be very careful about where you put your feet on the sidewalk. Which is all sorts of fun when you're trying to run and catch a bus.
Completely unrelated to anything else, I find myself stuck in a sort of social limbo lately. I act too old for men around my own age, and I feel too young for anyone older. Not that they all tell me "you're too young to remember X", but I get to feeling that way anyway. Thank you very much, I know what a turntable is, and I even owned one when I was a kid.
On the other hand, I don't want to start anything with anybody until I know whether I'm spending the next couple of years in Ohio or not. Eventually, in the dim and distant future, I'd like to get married, but I don't want to be having my first kid at 35. I don't really want kids at all, actually. I just don't have the patience for them.
I've been in touch with my first love again lately, and it's bringing up all sorts of thoughts. I know that no two relationships are ever the same, but I want to feel loved like that again. I felt like I was the most important person in the world to somebody and, knowing that, that anything I wanted was possible if I could only figure out how to do it. I miss that, constantly. The thing is, I have no idea if it's possible to find that again with somebody else, because no two relationships are ever alike. I don't think I could in good conscience marry somebody I didn't feel that way about, though.
All right, that's quite enough of that
I've been thinking about the time I spent in France when I was in college, and mostly remembering the things I liked. I'm very fond of the idea that lunch should be a reason to close everything for two hours and enjoy a meal, preferably at home. Lunch here, on the other hand, is something you have exactly an hour to find and inhale on your way back to work, because of course work is more important than anything else in the world. Sigh.
Another thing I envy the Europeans is the idea of going out every day and buying what you're going to eat for that day. I suppose you can do that here too, but when was the last time you stood behind someone in the grocery store who was buying one or two meals' worth of food? People here just don't do that. You go to the grocery store and buy everything in sight so you don't have to go grocery shopping again for three weeks. OK, I exaggerate, but that's the idea.
One of the things I don't miss is the fact that nobody in France curbs their dogs, so you have to be very careful about where you put your feet on the sidewalk. Which is all sorts of fun when you're trying to run and catch a bus.
Completely unrelated to anything else, I find myself stuck in a sort of social limbo lately. I act too old for men around my own age, and I feel too young for anyone older. Not that they all tell me "you're too young to remember X", but I get to feeling that way anyway. Thank you very much, I know what a turntable is, and I even owned one when I was a kid.
On the other hand, I don't want to start anything with anybody until I know whether I'm spending the next couple of years in Ohio or not. Eventually, in the dim and distant future, I'd like to get married, but I don't want to be having my first kid at 35. I don't really want kids at all, actually. I just don't have the patience for them.
I've been in touch with my first love again lately, and it's bringing up all sorts of thoughts. I know that no two relationships are ever the same, but I want to feel loved like that again. I felt like I was the most important person in the world to somebody and, knowing that, that anything I wanted was possible if I could only figure out how to do it. I miss that, constantly. The thing is, I have no idea if it's possible to find that again with somebody else, because no two relationships are ever alike. I don't think I could in good conscience marry somebody I didn't feel that way about, though.
All right, that's quite enough of that
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you can never go home again
Date: 2003-04-07 09:56 am (UTC)Nostalgia is the fiction we tell ourselves to make our past bearable, to excuse all the petty cruelties and stupid mistakes in favor of those shining moments that become larger the further we get away from them.
You will never find someone who loves you in quite the same way you were loved by your first love. But you may yet find someone who loves you more deeply for yourself, and loves you better for understanding who they themselves are first. In the end, even love is just one small piece of a relationship - love alone is never enough.
Re: you can never go home again
Date: 2003-04-07 11:27 am (UTC)Re: you can never go home again
Date: 2003-04-10 08:22 am (UTC)Longish I know.
Date: 2003-04-10 02:27 pm (UTC)I can understand where you're coming from with the age issues. I've always had issues with the ages of the women I dated. With rare exception, I've always dated women who were older than me to varying degrees.
Not being able to start a relationship because of the uncertainty of the future is a kind of frustration all its own. I remember spending a lot of time resenting the circumstances that were changing my life,a nd the doubts that surrounded it. There were a lot of opportunities I lost because I didn't want to do anything short term. One woman in particular stands out in my memory. I could have had something with her, but I knew anything we had would last a few months at most, and I decided that I'd rather remember her as the biggest romantic "What if" of my life than as someone who was torn from me by distance and frustration.
I think everyone remembers their first love. People tend to develop nick names for their past romances, and for the longest time my first love resided in my mind as "The girl I should have married." No doubt my memories have idealized her a bit, but she was one of the most loving, caring and wonderful people I ever knew.
The relationship is the only one I've ever had where I can definitively say it was 100% my fault that it ended. It's the classic "Didn't know what I had" syndrome. To this day, she's the rule by which I measure all other women. It probably took me a decade to really get over her, and even then...
One thing I remember is that she was the first woman who really wanted to have a family with me. She was the first one help me see how much I really wanted to be a father. After I broke up with her it was a good six years before I could see myself as having a family with anyone else.
It's good that you've been able to keep in touch with your first love. I can't count the times I've wondered what happened to my Jenny after she and I parted ways.
There's one last thing. A man doesn't have to be blind to love someone for who they really are. It may help, but it's not a requirement. True, there are plenty of guys out there who will be interested in you and never see past your body, but there are also men who will get to know you and fall in love. You just need to give yourself the chance to experience it and be open to love.