Love & Reassurance in anticlimatic

My high school girlfriend and I had a pretty funny meet-cute at this Christian “youth group” my buddy would invite me to every Tuesday (free pizza after). It was a whole new scene for me- new group of kids my own age, radically different mentalities than the one I was used to at public, and they were a little nicer. They all went to this private Christian school (one that I would later attend myself, and be expelled from for being an anti-authoritarian).

At one particular youth group, they were getting down with some pretty kinky shit.

We were all outside sitting on these picnic tables, and the (outnumbered) girls were tasked with selecting a boy, and having that boy take his shoes off, so she could wash his feet like Mary Magdalene did for Jesus, in one of those stainless steel old fashioned basins. Something to reinforce humility, and a woman’s subservient role in life, or some stupid non-denominational Christian shit.

Much to my surprise, the girl who would go on to be my partner for three high school years (eternity) until we would ultimately break up over the phone shortly after graduation, tapped me on the shoulder- and I was so shocked and nervous that I let my body depart the picnic table before my feet, and subsequently backflip face planted, in front of everyone, right at her feet.

I assumed I was cooked, socially, and was quite prepared to never show my face there again- but for reasons I’ll never understand, somehow that sealed the deal for her and an item we became. Of course she picked me because she liked me- she said it was my sinister grin and the fact that I was a “bad boy” (not a hard accomplishment at a Christian youthgroup, let me tell you), but there was a reason I was caught off guard with her advances- I, personally, wasn’t attracted to her. Initially.

Which is an odd thing to say about this woman, as she was incredibly picturesque. She was quite tall, almost as tall as me, but had a figure that flattered her height, and her face looked like it was drawn by a disney animator. And she had long beautiful blonde hair, which she took good care of…but honestly my friends found her more attractive than I did, because although it (clearly) wasn’t high on my list of priorities for a mate, I was infinitely more attracted to very short women, because of how they might feel to me in intimate settings, as someone who is very personally turned on by feeling exceptionally masculine in those moments.

It was through getting to know her- her home life, her insecurities- that I came to understand, at least a little bit, what it’s like being girl in this world. She lived in a trailer, with her mother and two brothers (both Gay, incidentally), and her Father was some kind of a janitor somewhere, and was almost never around. Like, he lived elsewhere it seemed. But once in a while he would show up and live there, and on one of those occasions they all had me over for a steak dinner to meet him.

It was creepy. He sucked the joy out of the room completely, and dinner was weirdly quiet. He didn’t look like a janitor- he looked more like a professor, with this neatly trimmed beard and clean outfit- but he had that miserable, sour, hyper-judgmental, constantly-disappointed look on his face and air about him, that made my lip curl in primal resentment. Everyone was on egg shells, and I vaguely remember being guilted into not eating the fatty nasty parts of the steak that I lopped off and had in a small discard pile at the corner of my plate. My girlfriend was like “aren’t you going to finish your steak?” and the table was dead silent, looking at me, like “well, aren’t you?” as though Dad watching meant I had to power it down. I said “nah, I don’t eat the disgusting parts” and somewhere a fork dropped, and it got awkward for a minute for literally no reason. That was the first and last time I met the guy, he skipped out shortly thereafter.

But what he left behind was a very understandably insecure daughter, even if she was objectively beautiful on paper. She had high EQ and was a good communicator, and we would constantly fight about how much reassurance she needed in our relationship, and I- moron, young person- would argue with her that I told her last month that I loved her, and why did she suddenly forget? Like bro, just go back and read my hand written letter, it says it right there, what more do you want from me?

At the time I didn’t get it, because what she was teaching me about women, and separately about reassurance, in this society of ours, wouldn’t reach my understanding for many many years.

Reassurance, it turns out, is just another warrior in the battle against Entropy.

Emotional, personal entropy- no different, in literal form at the most fundamental level, from the same physical entropy that, very slowly but in front of our eyes, is tearing apart literally everything around you. Routinely changing the oil in your car is kind of an on-the-nose example of of this concept, but I’m not sure people appreciate how much it applies to almost everything. From the slowly melting glass of your window panes, to the slowly eroding blocks under your house foundation. Everything both physical and stemming from physical, like relationships and mental acuity, is constantly being pulled apart right in front of us.

Sometimes it is too slow to see, like with the melting glass, but sometimes it moves very quickly- and relationships, particularly with women that have high trait anxiety and minds that move a mile a minute, can come completely undone in less than 24 hours of thought and subsequent emotional processing.

It is not a force that relents, so to combat it we must be equally unrelenting. Ideally, more unrelenting. So if you love someone, tell them. Tell them every day. Spread it on, and keep spreading it on. Don’t be afraid to look like a dork doing it, either.

I am annoyed with how long winded this has gotten despite me needing to only get two small points out of my head, but alas here we go- soldiering on.

There is a bible quote that I hear all the time, though I don’t remember exactly how it goes, something about God’s commandments- which ends with:

”........the greatest of which, is Love.”

I can’t remember if it is a list of commandments, or a list of values, but it struck me recently with how accurate that is, in surprising ways. I think Leonard Cohen said it even better:

“Love is is the only engine of survival.”

And here is the point- it’s not about the person you Love, the benefit:
You don’t save people by loving them, you save yourself by loving.
And by saving yourself, you actually do save other people- or at least retain the ability to do so, if called upon.

To love is to empathize. It is the elimination of space between yourself and the receiver. The elimination of the illusion of separation. I am you, and you are me. Where you live, I live. Where you die, I die.

And sometimes these people do die, and for every advance payment of Love in a relationship. there is a debt of grief to be paid when reality forces separation upon us- at least for a little while, until we all are together again in death. And it is the payment of this debt of grief that balances us out, horrible as it is to experience at the time.

It is an intimate reminder of how much hidden pain anyone can carry, for any strange reason, and as hard as it is on us, the reminder of that makes us better to those around us. Holistically, the Christians (and Leonard Cohen) are right:

It is Love that sustains the human race.