Then you get to middle school or high school and it's all about the dating and discovering that really cooties weren't all bad and that your entire life (and its happiness) depended on whether or not you had a boyfriend or girlfriend. Also, you may or may not have discovered sex and the awkwardness ensues.
Recently, when my family and I had the chance to go back to Mexico where I had spent most of my childhood, I was confronted with a rather unfortunate truth of life. As much as the memories we rediscovered caused joy, there was a measure of pain wrapped up in the middle. Multiple times my mother was on the verge of tears. We discovered people who remembered us, people who didn't or chose not to, people who had split, or people who had fallen upon hard times. I'll never forget my mother's comment that people were both bringers of happiness and of immeasurable pain. That was the day I realized life would never be perfect. It may have been delusional of me to ever consider that it would be, but the point remains. I grew up a bit more that day in a tiny kitchen in Tlaxiaco watching my mother wipe the tears from her eyes and confess in a round-about way the reason for her occasional attempts at distancing herself from friendships. People and the resulting interactions are painful.
College has been such a time of discovery, and the more I learn the more I see my ignorance. I've learned more about myself in the last five months than I have in the past couple of years. Coupled with that though, I've again learned some of the harsher truths of life.
Montaigne is an interesting character. While reading his essay titled "On Some Verses of Virgil" one may find themselves a bit shocked at 1) how little he talks of Virgil and 2) how much he talks of his own "member." But put aside all his side comments of how flaccid he looks or how he has a problem with premature ejaculation, and you find an interesting discourse on marriage and love. He defines love as the purely lustful desires. He claims that love and marriage cannot coexist. He says infidelity is bound to happen and should be no surprise. I may be oversimplifying or understating his points, but in the discussion that followed I found myself rather pessimistic as to the future of any marriage of mine. Is marriage or any relationship doomed like a flame without fuel? Obviously, if it is based in lust and carnal love the answer would be yes. But does this mean that marriage must be totally without any passion? Is the lack of passion, the loss of the "allure", truly why so many people leave their marriages? Is that why the US, country of consumerism and individuality and a "please yourself attitude", has a 50% failure rate in marriages? Though it may not be the only reason, it seems like a factor in the bigger problem. So what now? Do I give up and doom myself to a marriage with no spark? Or do I merely recognize the spark will one day die or become "the normal" and the marriage will have to fall back on a foundation stronger than lust? Is it that easy? My parents make it seem so, however in these cases my pessimism comes out and I'm tempted to ask how any marriage survives. Not that this means that I'm some sex-crazed person! Not at all! I'm merely curious as to the problem with passion and friendship coexisting in a marriage. Is it possible or do I have to choose? Or am I just confusing myself?
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