To tell the truth, I've never loved any girl (or boy) that much in my life (I don't know if this is an extension of my Aspergers or not), so this is a difficult rambling for me to comment on. But you reminded me of some things.
Some advice I received about love is that you will eventually find him or her annoying. Exceptions happen almost never.
My parents divorced when I was but a young teen. I still don't know why, exactly, they did that. They never wanted to tell me and I never wanted to ask.
Eh, what I put down there was more of an example - it's a very sped up version of events which were... a lot more complicated (coincidently, one of the complicating factors actually was Asperger's - although I'm only a borderline case myself).
But one of the things I definitely took out of the meltdown, was that what you think is 100% certain to last might not be so certain a year down the line. If I've learnt anything, it's not to think you understand love and how it works to a T. Emotions aren't the most reliable of things.
As a person in an LDR I can totally relate. It's been over a year and knowing of cases where it does work out is very encouraging. It was frightening and depressing to even ponder the idea before we decided to go for it. It has been and will be hard. We think we can make it but that doesn't help the "pining for the other person nonsensically." I'm pretty much a cynic and yet this crazy thing called love makes us risk it. Honestly I don't regret it but I'm aware it could fail. Paolini definitely is trivializing the concept, and I will definitely be pointing that out when I review that chapter. Thank you for sharing that.
Oh man, LDRs are hard. It's been 18 months for me and my girlfriend, and the number of times I've wished that I could afford a blasted plan ticket just so I could see her for a few hours is so high I've lost track.
Hardest relationship I've ever been in, for so many reasons (the distance just makes it worse), but at the same time it feels like the most worthwhile one too.
I completely agree with you. (And recently I stopped answering e-mail from an Eragon fan because she told me that love at first sight IS possible because it happened to her. Obviously ANYTHING "at first sight" IS NOT LOVE, and that was my point, even though people have sorta unexplained connections all the time that morph from attraction to infatuation to mature love and they can trace it back to when they first laid eyes on each other. The problem is that immediately laying eyes on someone and having a connection that doesn't go anywhere is much much more common and isn't love
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That's an excellent quote! It's funny how people (especially, if I can say it without sounding jaded, young people) think they're infallible, and aren't afraid to trumpet their certainty to the heavens.
LOTS of people form a bond quickly and end up having that develop into actual companionate love. But it bothers me how some people think the infatuation stage or the physical attraction or the initial impressions are the same thing as "love." It really cheapens the idea of what love is if you can "love" someone by LOOKING AT THEM. I imagine they're telling themselves it's more than just looking--that they're recognizing each other in some supernatural or hyper-aware way--and I've even had this sort of thing HAPPEN to me, but AT THAT POINT IT WAS NOT LOVE.
This reminds me of the ending of Great Expectations. I haven't read it, but my writing tutor used it as an example of a good ambiguous ending. Dickens originally finished the book with Pip unattached, but he was told it was too sad, so he rewrote it to imply Pip would marry Estella. And even then, he didn't feel like he had the authority to dictate whether they would make a good couple for the rest of their lives and force that interpretation on the reader.
So instead of having a definite ending, Pip simply says that he THINKS he'll be with her forever. We know the characters are together in the here and now, but further on, the reader can decide for themselves if they think it'll be a lasting marriage or whether the couple will end up having problems. That's what a MATURE writer would do.
I guess in modern terms Dickens was a huge shipping enabler.
I actually finished Great Expectations a week ago. It reminded me of Eragon & Arya a lot - you had a very human, boyish hero from a lower class background trying to gain the affections of a cold-hearted ice queen from a higher class background. Except Pip was actually fairly likeable (even if I didn't like the book too much).
What I also liked was that Estella's disdainful and cold view of men was presented as a flaw, and after her marriage to a wealthy man purely because of his position (because Estella in her cynicism thought love was impossible), she returned to Pip somewhat humbler, and it was made clear that she had gone through an ordeal. But it was subtle enough that Dickens hadn't changed her character completely, and wasn't chastising her. Which is unlike Arya, who has to go through several personality transplants to like Eragon in return, because as two people go they're chalk and cheese and don't naturally get on.
Eh, I wouldn't highly recommend GE. Dickens isn't that great with female characters as a whole. And it's not really that much about the romance - it's a side plot, to an extent.
This romantic ace strongly disagrees with your assessment; I don't have the desire for sex, but I have felt romantic attraction. People do have the unsettling habit of blurring lust and love, though, which can certainly make it seem like love is a prettying up of lust.
Yeah, I think love gets a bad rap because people too often confuse it with lust. Lust is all about consuming, taking, and satisfying wants. Real love is about giving, self-sacrifice, and wanting good for the other. I do think real love is a lot more rare than society would have us believe. We throw around the word like it's nothing - "I LOVE ice cream!" "I LOVE Doctor Who!" "I LOVE Tuesdays!" And then we try to use the same word to describe the sort of feeling that drives people to die for one another? No wonder we're confused!
Love is not the stuff you see in romantic comedies. It is not the same thing as sex. It does not feed off of bitterness, jealousy, arrogance, or greed. It comes in many different forms, many of which are completely non-romantic. A person can believe in love, and be capable of loving, even without sex and/or romance.
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Some advice I received about love is that you will eventually find him or her annoying. Exceptions happen almost never.
My parents divorced when I was but a young teen. I still don't know why, exactly, they did that. They never wanted to tell me and I never wanted to ask.
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But one of the things I definitely took out of the meltdown, was that what you think is 100% certain to last might not be so certain a year down the line. If I've learnt anything, it's not to think you understand love and how it works to a T. Emotions aren't the most reliable of things.
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Hardest relationship I've ever been in, for so many reasons (the distance just makes it worse), but at the same time it feels like the most worthwhile one too.
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LOTS of people form a bond quickly and end up having that develop into actual companionate love. But it bothers me how some people think the infatuation stage or the physical attraction or the initial impressions are the same thing as "love." It really cheapens the idea of what love is if you can "love" someone by LOOKING AT THEM. I imagine they're telling themselves it's more than just looking--that they're recognizing each other in some supernatural or hyper-aware way--and I've even had this sort of thing HAPPEN to me, but AT THAT POINT IT WAS NOT LOVE.
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So instead of having a definite ending, Pip simply says that he THINKS he'll be with her forever. We know the characters are together in the here and now, but further on, the reader can decide for themselves if they think it'll be a lasting marriage or whether the couple will end up having problems. That's what a MATURE writer would do.
I guess in modern terms Dickens was a huge shipping enabler.
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What I also liked was that Estella's disdainful and cold view of men was presented as a flaw, and after her marriage to a wealthy man purely because of his position (because Estella in her cynicism thought love was impossible), she returned to Pip somewhat humbler, and it was made clear that she had gone through an ordeal. But it was subtle enough that Dickens hadn't changed her character completely, and wasn't chastising her. Which is unlike Arya, who has to go through several personality transplants to like Eragon in return, because as two people go they're chalk and cheese and don't naturally get on.
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Love is not the stuff you see in romantic comedies. It is not the same thing as sex. It does not feed off of bitterness, jealousy, arrogance, or greed. It comes in many different forms, many of which are completely non-romantic. A person can believe in love, and be capable of loving, even without sex and/or romance.
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