Designated Heart Driver

Little known fact about me...I'm a total sap. As in, my favorite songs are almost always love songs, I adore a good romance novel and besides comedies my favorite movies are, you guessed it, l-o-v-e stories. Perhaps that's why I love (excuse the excessive use of the word, it's going to be found quite a bit in this post so get used to it) my job so much...that and the fact that it caters to my OCD perfectly. Recently I've been doing a lot of soul searching, trying to find "the meaning" of my little ol' life. I've been looking around at other people's relationships and trying to figure out what makes them work or what inevitably makes them fail in the hope to find some great big secret to success to one's love life.

What I have examined thus far has been this:
a.) Toxic relationships where the parties involved refuse to end them for the fear of being alone.
b.) Situations where some push others away in fear of another not accepting them as they really are.
c.) People who want love so badly that they accept ridiculous behavior from their partner.
d.) Relationships where one is holding on so tightly for fear of the other finding someone better.
e.) My parents and how badly that crumbled.
f.) My past relationships and how at one point I thought the sun rose and set with a person when in truth they were entirely wrong for me in nearly every way.

So, the saying must be true. Love is blind. Or, rather, that while in love you are blind to your partner's downfalls, their insanity, your fears, your insecurities. All you can see is that you love.

And, somehow, knowing that it typically doesn't end well, I still want that crazy-in-love feeling. I still have faith that two people can actually get it right. I know that it will never be rainbows and sunshine 24/7. I know that hurt feelings, jealousy and other neuroses can arise when two people share a life together. But I also know that when two people commit to sharing themselves with the each other and understand that certain things have to exist for any relationship to succeed (obligation has to be reciprocal, dependence is mutual and independence is equal) that things can be quite rosy. It is keeping a hold on who you are and accepting who the other is, as is. But besides all that pretty sounding stuff you have to know, without a shadow of a doubt, that the person you choose wants the same things as you do. That they see life in the same general way that you do. You have to know that they've done their growing up, that they've spent enough time alone to be okay with themselves.

Maybe people are just as in love with the idea of love as I am and that's why there are so many failed relationships. Love is intoxicating. Before you know it, you're in it. You've hardly had half a chance to really look at that other person to see if they are ready for you or if you're even fit for each other before you're punch drunk in love. Perhaps more relationships would work if people truly knew what they want in a partner and took the time to see it in another person before letting their heart walk the plank. Maybe our hearts need a d.d. Anyone ever think of, I don't know, thinking it through first? Letting your brain be the d.d.?

Well, that's my newest ambition. To not be love drunk ever again.

Now where'd I put my romance novel?