I'm Romantic

It has taken me a number of years to establish myself as a romantic.  I smile on impulse when I hear romantic stories, not just any smile but the type that extends through the whole face to the ears.  That's the type of smile that I have as my goal these days, especially since I'm finding it hard to smile at all.  So I set my stakes high.

If there's one thing that will cheer me up it's a real love story.  The story needs characters that I'm drawn toward with a level of obsessiveness.   The effect of these stories on my affective position is an increase in childlike joy, including laughter.  There are some distinctions that I need to make in how it is that I love these stories.  I don't like the stories where the love spans all through childhood and lasts into adulthood and then on through to old age.  Wait, I take that back, I do like those.

I don't like the stories of one partner hurting the other in some unfair move in the game of love and they still end up together despite it all.  Actually, I like those too.  I especially like the stories where the love moves one or both of the partners into doing sort of silly things.  For example one partner all of a sudden decides they need time alone right when they should be confessing their love.  Really though I don't know what I'm talking about there, either.

What romance means to me is a willingness to imagine what it is that you desire and to go for it.  Finding a partner who is willing to go there with you is the best thing, someone who is open-minded enough to strive for real romantic love, the passionate, silly, dedicated kind.  This can only happen within the context of a close relationship, though.  It doesn't work when both people aren't all for it.  I've experienced that before and it's just no good.  Intimacy is so important.  The bounds of intimacy are endless.  I can see it lasting far into old age.