Adulting: Let's Talk About What They Don't Tell You

Prologue

     Love.

     A simple four letter word. Yet most don't fully understand the meaning until they reach adolescence. Some never come to understand it. A four letter word, that is so hard to describe. For instance, if an alien were to come to earth and give us an ultimatum in which the fate of humankind rested on one average person's definition of love, I think we'd all be meeting our maker. At least I know for sure that would be the case for me.

     Although I wouldn't be able to eloquently describe love in it's purest form, I can describe the examples of "love" that have been set before me.

     My most prominent example of love was my parents. Even as a kid, I thought that the way my parents showed their love for each other was a bit odd. The main reason was because they seemed more like friends or rather acquaintances, nowhere near true loves. They never hugged or kissed, never even held hands. PDA didn't exist in their vocabulary. I thought that was how people showed love, just by being in close proximity. It wasn't that they didn't want my brothers and me to see either. To this day they still don't show any indication that the relationship that they have is anything more than platonic. Their lack of affection became my only reference for love. Though kids catch on to the ways of society soon enough.

     That leads me to my next example of love. Cinderella. I know so original of me. I saw the movie around the time I was starting pre-school. Watching that movie was eye-opening. I must have watched it 30 times that year. Everything in the movie seemed to be a dream; the fairy godmother, the ball, and the prince! I couldn't get enough. At first I thought it's a man and a women that became husband and wife that's similar to what I know though I knew it was different somehow. Even though Prince Charming and Cinderella only danced and talked for a little while, there was something different about the way they interacted in comparison to my parents. Re-watching the movie as an adult, I think the younger me saw the glint in his eyes and understood that to be love.

     Comparing my two most memorable examples I found that sometimes the fantasy can be better than the reality. In Cinderella, you know what to expect. In the movie, Prince Charming goes to the ends of the earth to find Cinderella. They look longingly with a glint in their eye, something akin to happiness but so much more. With reality, I saw two people going through the motions. I saw fights from morning till night. I heard curses towards the one they are supposed to love. Rather than bedtime stories, I had nightly sugar coated explanations. Those same nights I heard my mom and dad say "We fight because we love each other". Each time they said that I always thought, "No two people who love each other should be able to say such hurtful words". When I think about it now my parents have never said "I love you" to each other, not really. I assume they said it during their wedding and many times after that, though one day they stopped meaning it and eventually stopped saying it all together. Although my parents' love story is very different from Cinderella's, they do have one thing in common. In both stories, they are still together. Cinderella and Prince Charming got there happily ever after and my parents just got the after. I still wonder why they still haven't gotten a divorce (even though my mom always threatens).

     As I began to realize the wonders of fantasy and how much better it can be than reality, I delved further into the fantasy world. When I was too young to read I watched romance movies. It all started with Cinderella but eventually, I went on to watch all kinds of princess movies. As I got older I started to read romantic stories. They started out as short stories then became full-blown novels, you know the ones with Fabio on the cover. Those became my examples from Twilight to the Sixteen Candles. They were my ideal perception of love. From the day I discovered the fantasy of love, I think the rest of my life followed suit. I'd rather live in a flawless fantasy than a flawed reality.