So What Of Love

I shall misquote the Dragonlance saga here.

I remember the tone of the words and the point of them even if I do not remember their exact words.

It was something along the lines of ' when I gave you that ring it was the love of an untamed heart. I had to grow up and know what true love was.'

I had to grow up as did my words.

Love at first sight rarely happens and when it does it is rarely perfect or without consequence.

I believe that everyone has someone they have left behind.

I do.

But it is real love?

The love of youth is rarely the love that we keep. It is a youthful newness that makes us think that this is the love of our lives. First experience that is so powerful and so fierce how could it be real?

It's your first kiss, your first drink and all the first that you take in the growth towards adulthood that we all take.

It is a natural path that most of us take without hiccup. We love we lose, we have those firsts in our own time and in our correct time. And we deal with the grief of loss when it comes.

Some people don't get to take the path the slow way. Others force steps upon them so what happens then?

A twisted understanding that breeds fear and distrust,

And that is where we find the princess.

No-one has loved her in the truest sense. No-one has held her hand or kissed her forehead gently or cared to ask her how she is.

So how can you explain to someone like that love is something to be welcomed?

The answer is that you can't.

When I started this the idea was that she would meet this mountain man who falls instantly in love with her and who she loves as well. But of course, it isn't straight forward as the tale keeps getting in their way.

Over the year or years, I can't decide which, he is the constant suitor, and she is the one that pushes him away. You know that story. The more she pushes the more he pushes back until there is one ultimate moment of clarity in the whole affair and they are together at last.

Its and old story. It's an obvious story and one that my teenage self would have appreciated.

And like most of the teenage scribbles they leave a hollow taste in my mouth now. Was I ever that naive or simple?

It is also said, amongst those that say such things, that putting obstacles in the way of a fervent lover is the best way of getting them to love more.

A prize at the end of the mishaps and other miss-things.

Both of them now have their own obstacles to not being together.

He has a wife and children, the daughter of their leader no less. She has her empty past of betrayals and nothing but an understanding of how she can use her beauty to further her needs and no concept that she can be loved.

Part of the story is the same. He leaves his home world and family for her. This may seem harsh at first reading, but you don't know his with like I do.

Then finding that he cannot sweep her off her feet, that culturally and intellectually she is far his superior.

A superior woman that needs nothing from him.

And it is a growing experience that is bubbling in the background of the tale itself. He has to realise that she is not the type of women he is used to dealing with. He has to understand her when she does not lend herself to being understood. And will that make him love her less. Will the meat and bones of her make him recoil?

And she has to understand that not only is she desirable that someone can find in her something to love.

This is the building blocks of what I want for them to reach their happy ever after, or as close to it as any of us come.

They will be together but only in the truest sense of love. Love is warts and all. It is weight gain and hair loss. It is loving when you are at your best and worst. It is reaching that point when you no longer need dramatic gestures or simple words. When the presence of someone in the room simply comforts you.

And that has come with my own experience. In the changes I recognise in myself as I look back at the one, I left behind and look left to the one who sits here still.

You don't understand that when you're young. Or you may get it but not appreciate it.

Love is an old blanket that wraps itself around you and keeps you safe. And just feeling its warmth is enough to know that everything will be alright.