How do we fall in love?

 

Gosh, I feel like I'm writing a cheesy 1960s pop hit, but the question is a genuine one. How do we fall in love? What makes us do it? How long does it take? How do we know it's love at the time? How do we know afterwards that it was love? What does it feel like?

Well that's a small set of questions for a 900-word blog post, so let's get going.

I think I should start off by saying that there are many people who don't believe in this concept of being 'in love' at all. It requires quite as much faith as a religious belief; you can't prove it or measure it, even if you feel it deeply. And, as with religion, having someone tell you about it (or even hearing a pop song about it) doesn't make it real to you and there is no reason that it ever will. So I am talking to the believers here, but we all know that sometimes that includes people who spent most of their lives not really believing in it (but perhaps going along with the formalities like cultural Catholics crossing themselves). I would probably put myself in that category for a good chunk of my life but now, I'm a believer! And I know of people who found out - to their joy - much much later than I did in life that love exists.

And of course, I am talking here about the romantic love of two people who feel attracted to each other emotionally, sexually, with their whole being. Who when they walk back into each other's company cannot but smile (and both think how lucky they are). And by talking about this kind of love I do not mean to rank it over all the other kinds of love in life. The love of parents for their children and vice versa, the love of siblings, the love of friends both ancient and new, and the love that you feel towards someone who is just so unutterably a good person, staunch, positive, a mensch, a pillar of the community. All these other loves are great and huge and we need them. But if we are lucky enough we also find the other kind. 

So how does it happen? Can it be the coup de foudre , the bolt from the blue, the love at first sight? I personally don't think so. You can be struck, you can see an expression on someone's face that goes to their soul and think that you know that soul. But I could see lots of problems with it. I remember someone saying 'And when I saw him I knew he was the man I was going to marry', but there are explanations beyond love at first sight that would explain that observation.

I am willing for the comments to correct me on this, but I think love grows from doing things together and especially from seeing how the other person treats other people. I think the sharing of things that neither of you have done before (stop sniggering) means you have a shared language of life and a thing that you hold between you and that draws you each to the other. I think that especially, seeing the way that the object of your love behaves towards other people shows you much more about how they regard you. I have heard people (women in particular) lament that they should have realized that the golden glow a particular man turned on them might be just for show, and they should have paid more attention to the way that man behaved towards everyone else (because one day they would be in the 'everyone else' category). I should maybe have thought about that myself. A red flag is a red flag in whichever direction it is waving. 

I think you can also know that you are in love when you have that glorious gift of being able to be completely, contentedly silent in each other's company. You do not need to 'keep the conversation going' because it is there in every breath and heartbeat. And after half an hour one of you says "Cup o tea?" and the other one smiles, as you had just jumped in before them. And I would link to this kind of happy silence the even quieter one (bar snoring) when you share a bed asleep with someone and feel them against you, unguarded and happy, both when you awake and in your subconscious sleep. I can never understand this separate beds business but YMMV.

I also know of people who were properly in love and then it ended for some reason. It could have been circumstances drove them apart; it could have been a bad decision from one of them which they regret but cannot change; it could even be simply wrong place wrong time, but if you know, you know. Even in their state, I count these people luckier than those who have never seen it or felt it.

Love is great. I had it for all those years with Cro after we really got to know each other. It made both of us happier and it is there still in my heart. I would also credit Cro if I ever fell in love again because our time together taught me what it was. For all I know, it also taught Cro what it was, but I never quizzed her on this. It was golden and it stays with me now, and I am pretty sure it would have stayed barring dementia into the 90s that we never saw (and will of course now never see). But love was and is wonderful and fully justifies all the cheesy pop songs when it is true and real. 

I thoroughly recommend love to anyone else and though it is not at all the only joy of life it is in my view the most glorious.