I wanna know what love is
If the Beatles were right and “all you need is love”, then I am in serious trouble. My brain is in a permanent state of malfunction. Perhaps I am, as my husband says, Peter Pan in my emotions having never left my teenage years behind. I can’t imagine wanting to be a teenager again, I was ridiculously bad at it the first go round. I guess I know I have love, but it seems I have spent my whole life trying to feel it.
Lust one can feel. That is easy-a queasy stomach filled with butterflies, a lump in the throat, maybe even skipping a breath or two. Hell, lust you can get from a tv show, just watch Logan and Veronica’s first kiss. It’s like porn for teenage girls. But I’m talking about real honest to goodness love. The kind your parents are supposed to have for you, the kind you get from your family and friends, and if you’re lucky, your soul mate (if you believe in that kinda thing).
I am sure I have people that love me. Some of them might even be offended by this post. If so, please know I don’t mean it as an insult or a lessening of your feelings. In fact I am jealous of them. I never seem to be able to register love. I can’t feel it. I never know if it is there. It is like this void in my soul. Seemingly I don’t care, but it is strange to see everyone else experiencing something you just don’t get and it isn’t as if someone can explain it to you. I can comprehend the love other people have, but I can’t see my own.
Zach Braff beautifully expressed a similar understanding in the movie Garden State. In particular is a scene where Large is explaining to Sam about being home sick for a place that doesn’t exist. I keep meeting people in my generation who swear they can’t feel love either. It is like an overwhelming sense of loneliness and an inexplicable lack of feeling. Perhaps we are all home sick for a feeling that never existed. Not to say that love never existed, just not in the fairy tale way we expected. Certainly I believe in love, but I also believe it is possible that we have unrealistic expectations of love which make us unable to recognize and fully appreciate it. I would go so far as to say, in our quest to find love and define it, we missed the little doses along the way and are now so starved we can’t find a source large enough to feed our appetite.
In fact, one of the reasons I became an actress was because I craved the feelings of love and attention the stage can provide. Eventually the curtain falls however and the high subsides. You end up right back where you started from (if you are lucky). Sometimes you manage to land lower than you were when you began. Honestly, it is worse than a sugar high! But I loved it. You know, they say everyone wants to be famous, and maybe that is true. But I really think everyone just wants to love and be loved. Some of us just don’t know where to begin.
Does this mean I and countless others like me are cursed to walk alone? No, I don’t think so. At least I hope not. Does this mean people don’t love us and we don’t love them? I don’t believe that either. I think it just means we have a lot to work on and apparently a whole lot of baggage to deal with.
P.S. Did anyone else see Avril Lavigne on Jay Leno? She looks weird all blonde and grown up. So much for the alternative skater girl, but I guess we all have to grow up sooner or later. Clearly, I’m still working on it.