Love, a Secondhand Emotion

I don’t remember being in love. I was thinking about it the other day, thinking about when the ex and I started dating, and I don’t remember the feeling I must have had of being in this all-consuming passion for another person.

Theoretically, I know it happened because I have memories of thinking that I couldn’t live without him, and not being able to wait until the next time I saw him. I certainly don’t have those feelings now. I haven’t felt anything like that for a long ass time. And when I thought I was feeling it, I know now it was actually a bad case of limerence.

My old memories of the early days with mr horrible are not tied to any emotions. I view them in my mind with the cold, emotionless evaluation of being obsessed with something, like a possession. And that’s troubling. Doesn’t feel like a normal reaction. I don’t think back and feel anything really. Why is that?

I thought back to earlier relationships, past boyfriends, and it is more of the same. I remember being fixated with the guy du jour. I was definitely infatuated. But eventually the feeling went away. Either they hurt me, and the allure faded, or they revealed something negative about themselves, and the desire to be with them went away, too. (Hindsight observation: I was better at handling red flags when I was younger. So sad that the marriage broke that helpful survival skill. 😢)

Which then makes me wonder if what I felt then was actually love? Would I recognize love if it actually happened to me? Probably not.

It makes me sad for the younger me, because technically, I should have some idea of what love feels like, even from a parental sense. But I know I don’t. My mother doesn’t love me. She certainly can’t show the emotion and doesn’t know the meaning of the word. What she thinks is love is a conditional transaction that she wields like the Sword of Damocles. And I am certain my father never loved me. I haven’t spoken to that man in over 20 years, and I don’t think my absence phased him at all. Not like I think it would have, if my distance was unwarranted.

So here I am, in a midlife quandary. What is love? And if I haven’t had it by this point in my life, am I missing out? Or is it a theme park I never bothered to visit, a box on the list I can decide isn’t getting checked? I mean, is it really all it’s cracked up to be? And am I even capable of the emotion?

I don’t know. This quandary doesn’t keep me up at night, but I have seen how not understanding what keeps two people drawn to each other has caused me to look at other couples with confusion. Like what’s the point? And why bother?

Because when I was in the trenches of my marriage to mr horrible, what was keeping us together was nothing but old-fashioned stubbornness on my part, and determination to not turn out like my mother. Which was, in the end, a pointless endeavor. Who was I trying to prove something to? I still don’t know what the fuck I was thinking.

But I worry that I have not been a good example for my sons, that they’ve never watched two people stay together for a reason worth staying for. It is bothersome that at no point have they had a good example of what a loving relationship looks like. Shit, I still haven’t seen a good example, and I’m middle-aged.