I heard this other song at work along the lines of “I may not know what love is, but I know what love ain’t” or something (/shudder at the thought of country music). The process of elimination is bland but apt. Let us delve into what people think what love is and why they’re so delusional.

(Preface: We have to assume the question refers to the love for ones spouse or spouse-to-be and appropriate mixture and order of agape, philos and eros.)

It’s hard to tell if Valentine was a saint, especially when there were multiple Valentines. Nevertheless, being martyrs, they traded a nominal, unknown yet inevitable death for a premature and agonizing execution all to share their unquenchable passion for their cause. The Catholic Church chose a week to celebrate (and otherwise uplift) the Valens (or ‘the worthy’) and their sacrifices (somehow more-so than the actual cause they died for). This week happened to encompass a separate pagan day worshiping lust, uncontrolled sexuality and fertility. Paganism abounds eventually and “romance” becomes the theme again. Nothing says “I love you” like “Be my Valentine and die a slow and painful death for my causes” especially when the cause is an inordinate craving for impurity.

This is funny, because the whole point of sticking ‘martyr-worship-day’ there in the first place was to get rid of the romantic theme. The root-word in romance here is -Roman- in that it is to say “love as the Romans did.” How did they love? Similar to every other act or emotion: proudly overstated with delusions of grandeur. Romanticism is art, however an exaggeration of expression to the point of inaccuracy; an illusion. Expressing love in embellishment not only precludes honesty, but discounts the intentions entirely. One who describes a love that is so real to them that it actually seems unreal to them has made their emotions so lofty that it is in fact unreal, indefinable at the very least and therefore inexpressible. Romance also celebrates expression with word and deed. Though sometimes these are the only viable options, generating this energy outwardly primarily rather than from within (or Above) can be outright baseless. Nothing says “I love you” like “Isn’t this unrealistically better than I can even pretend it could be? Uh, I mean romantic?”

Courtly love is a little more recent but is still argued on how and for what purpose it originally held. It probably has since evolved (or devolved?) to its own system (I know courting is actually different, but not necessarily mutually exclusive to the same problems), but let’s check out the ye-olde style courting, AKA yon knightly or yon not-so-knightly trying to pick up some yon chicks. According to Barbara Tuchman, courting consisted of variable stages (plus my parenthetical commentary):

• Attraction to the lady, usually via eyes/glance (Okay nothing wrong with being physically attracted to someone, but kind of vain in and of itself.)
• Worship of the lady from afar (Apparently this guy’s either lustful, deifying a human being or just a plain creeper.)
• Declaration of passionate devotion (devotion to what? Her body? Something between step 2 and 3 is definitely missing.)
• Virtuous rejection by the lady (Well I don’t blame her, but even if everything was legit by this point, don’t you think this step should be at least optional & skip to the end? Turtle mating rituals comes to mind for some reason.)
• Renewed wooing with oaths of virtue and eternal fealty (At least he doesn’t give up right away, but he still doesn’t have anything other than trying to convince someone to do something they already don’t want to commit to. Only thing worse would be her submission beyond this point (unless he miraculously turns sincere, doubtful), but, if this guy has to vow on virtue, he’s admitting he already struggles and has a reputation of failure in that area. Let your ayes be ayes and nays be nays!)
• Moans of approaching death from unsatisfied desire [and other physical manifestations of lovesickness] (He’s reached desperation at this point and is exhausting all options before the next step which he doesn’t seem like he wants to bother to do. Beyond outright lies, having to convince someone to change their heart about oneself shouldn’t be harder than simply observing their honest countenance.)
• Heroic deeds of valor which win the lady’s heart (Took him long enough, but shouldn’t he have done or want to do this already regardless of reward?)
• Consummation of the secret love (Stupid girl gets it on with stupid guy, but hey, can’t blame them, it’s the Middle-Ages; we got the Black Death runnin’ around so I suppose a little procreation should be in order anyway.)
• Endless adventures and subterfuges avoiding detection (wait, what? This whole thing was on the DL? Wow… I’m astounded; all that -and- they avoided the “he-said-she-said” business. Wait till the folks find out, oh they’re dead from the plague, okay…. Well, carry on then…)

Animalistic. Nothing says “I love you.” like “Your mind and emotional wellbeing are in the way of your body. Move them now, I’m horny; I’ll do anything, I’m desperate.”

What do these three ever-so-often-seen assumptions on how “Love should be” in our western society have in common? First off, they all compare themselves to passions someone else has had in the past. This assumes their love couldn’t get any better than that and is struggling to sustain that same level if it can ever get there. It also precludes that this level of passion is entirely reliant on the comparison and without it goes back to ‘realistic-mode’ which, to some, puniness outweighs sincerity. Nothing’s wrong with a little allegory and simile to accent an emotion, (“Our love is like a seed, it grows ‘n stuff” is somehow better than “My love for you is kinda like someone else’s love for some other person.”) Secondly, these three venues share an idea of ‘conditional love.’ It’s either someone else has to accept or do something for the inquirer or the inquirer has to subject the inquired ultimatums and requirements. Whatever happened to loving someone for who they are, instead for what they’ve done (sorry batman) or for who someone else is?

I have to say I’ve never seen a couple in a relationship, married or otherwise, that I’m impressed with. The only one I’ve heard of that comes close off the top of my head would have to be Adam and Eve, pre-fall. I know the Adam ‘knew’ Eve term has several meanings, but it shouldn’t. Whoever I might find, I want to know them in every way for who they are. Ugh, longpost is long. Not sure if I’ve said enough or too much, but there it is; a post on Friday, happy now?

Ninja Edit: Oh yea, I wanted to share this ‘lovely’ video as a sort of Valentine to you all (ok, no I don’t really want you all to die but watch it anyway). Did a ‘lil scooping on it and found it’s about someone who’s trying to learn the lesson that if you want to love someone, you still have to cope with that person. Love doesn’t come without a little hate, and if you can’t love someone at their worst, how can you call it sincere? The main character seems to be caught in a grey area between stabbing voodoo dolls and daydreaming about her special someone (wide grey area), all because they stole the precious thing: her heart. Random obligatory counting in foreign languages and also the ending is beautiful.

Reference(s):

Tuchman, Barbara Wertheim, A Distant Mirror: the Calamitous Fourteenth Century (New York: Knopf, 1978),