Sunday, October 16, 2005
Love Itself Was Gone

yesterday i went out with my cousins and my aunt, and in between snippets of our exchanges i casually revealed that i wouldn't mind marrying a man who is more than 20 years my senior as long as i love him enough. my confession was met with strong disapproval (they found the very idea of falling in love with someone so much older than me an absurdity) and this morning my aunt brought up this issue with my mum during their phone conversation, and after hanging up my mum asked to speak to me, echoing my aunt's sentiments that i shouldn't be entertaining such thoughts. this condemnation is a slap across the face, but all i did was to remain quietly defiant; i did not argue for i know she wouldn't understand; if she doesn't understand now she never will.

"this is absolutely ridiculous," my mum stated her stand, "when you are in your 20s your husband will already be in his 50s, and with his mildly wrinkling skin and gradually graying hair and fading charm, i can't imagine how you could bring yourself to be intimate with him." she then continued with groundless accusations like, "i think you've been reading too much 'jane eyre' and 'lolita'; they're too radical," (damn i shouldn't have told her about how much i'm in love with mr. rochester), and went on and on about how by marrying a man so much older than i am i will end up having to provide for him instead of he for me, how when he passes away i will be left behind as a young widow having to fend for myself, and how selfish he is to be robbing me of my prime, etc.

now in case you wish to know, in my opinion, sex and love are very different and can be independent of each other, but when they decide to merge as one, i would call the very beauty of it a process of making love. to me there is a fine line between them: sex is without any emotions attached and the pleasure one derives from mere sex is restricted to physical pleasure and physical pleasure alone; but sex with love is equivalent to making love ("and i don't know how you do it,/making love out of nothing at all"), for there are feelings entailed, and the resulting consequence is the ethereal union of two souls into one at the very moment they decide to come together. now so what if i fall for a man so much older than i am, and so what if he has gradually graying hair and mildly wrinkling skin; as long as in him i see my likeness, my equal and my being, i would gladly make love to him. wrinkles can be lovely too, they mark the trails which time has left behind on his face (as time has always done to everyone, and will sooner or later do to me), and sadness is engraved as it steals across his brows, emanating from him a glow which no man who hasn't survived the erosion of youth could acquire. of course i'm not saying for sure that i will and must marry an old man; i'm just saying that i'm open to that option.

also i find it amusing how my mum assumes that old men have only fading charm. look at richard gere - he is charming, isn't he? i could very well fall in love with him; imagine the joy it would bring to wake up every morning with the most misty and mystical feeling, wondering to yourself if it really is true that you now have in possession such a wonderful man whom you can finally call your own; and then you turn around and at the other side of your pillow you see him in his deepest sleep, and immediately you know it is not just a dream and that yes, he is right here with you, at this very moment, on this same bed. feelings of surrealism would then vanish and now you feel real instead of surreal, and you just grow to love him more and more as he is the only person in the entire world who could make you feel surreal and real at the same time. such contrasting emotions; and yet they still combine easily and wonderfully into one. he could deliver you away from earth and straight to heaven, and then he could pull you down again from the clouds above. he looks so much like a child and so innocent in his solace that you do not bear to disturb him from his silent repose; so all you could do is to secretly plant a kiss on his forehead and gently stroke his diminishing sideburn, as he transports you in backward motion through the passage of time: he reminds you of your childhood and it makes you sigh that too little praise has been lavished on the primal innocence which children possess (gone are the days, and oh, gone is the youth; how you wish you never have to grow up, how you wish you could retain the simplicity); and then he brings you forward into the future: he shows you how you are going to be like when you grow old: like him you are going to lie serenely in bed every morning and allow the sunlight to seep through the curtains and into the room and caress your soul ("the light came through the window,/straight from the sun above./And so inside my little room,/there plunged the rays of Love"); like him you are one day going to be submerged in a sea of ashes as you return to where you belong. and your expression will be peaceful, and you will be carrying a smile. you will be carrying a smile.

if you can strike a chord in my heart and let love reverberate through my vacant soul; if you would allow me be with you and watch you grow old (older than you already are; and allow me to grow old with you); if you promise to share with me your last moments and give me a chance to shelter you from the cold (and cold will be your lifeless body, as you eventually die and reduce to become only a memory); i would gladly love you so.

and it really doesn't matter if you're 20 years older than i am, it doesn't matter at all.


The light came through the window,
straight from the sun above.
And so inside my little room,
there plunged the rays of Love.

In streams of light I clearly saw
the dust you seldom see;
out of which the Nameless makes
a Name for one like me.

I'll try to say a little more:
Love went on and on,
until it reached an open door.
Then Love Itself,
Love Itself was gone.

All busy in the sunlight,
the flecks did float and dance;
and I was tumbled up with them
in formless circumstance.

I'll try to say a little more:
Love went on and on,
until it reached an open door.
Then Love Itself,
Love Itself was gone.

Then I came back from where I'd been;
my room: it looked the same;
but there was nothing left between
the Nameless and the Name.

All busy in the sunlight,
the flecks did float and dance;
and I was tumbled up with them,
in formless circumstance.

I'll try to say a little more:
Love went on and on,
until it reached an open door.
Then Love Itself,
Love Itself was gone.
Love Itself was gone.

- Leonard Cohen, Love Itself.


(P/S: I'm fully aware that I sound stupidly idealistic in this entry.)
(P/P/S: On another note, I love Katie Melua :D )

1:45 PM - and Time will say nothing but 'I told you so'.
Check out Chinese version of my bleeding voice [here].
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