Dear Sappho,
How can I get my lover to be more romantic? I know she loves me and is committed to our relationship, but I long to be wined and dined. Valentine’s day is next week and although I’m not expecting a romantic evening, I’m dreaming of one. Do you think love and romance are different entities or different phases of a relationship? I have tried to tell her how I crave more romance in our relationship but she doesn’t seem to get it.
My Heart Wants Romance
Dear Heart,
ReplyDeleteLove is not limited to romance, but romance is tied to love. It is possible to love without romance your parents, your siblings, and your friends. Romance and love are not mutually exclusive. Romance, as we know it today, grew out of a literary genre developed by Marie of France who commissioned Chretien de Troyes to write about noble and heroic knights who were on a quest for both the Holy Grail and along the way had magical adventures that featured chivalric romance.
The concept of romantic love was made real by the circumstances of courtly love. Lovers engaged in trysts, usually extramarital with women as a quest created for pleasure rather than for marriage. Since at the time marriage was a formal arrangement, courtly love was a way for people to express the love not typically found in marriage. Lovers did not make sex mandatory, but acted out of a heightened expression of emotional loving.
In many cultures arranged marriages and betrothals are commonplace, and may conflict with romance due to the arrangements made. Although it is possible that romance and love can grow between the partners in an arranged marriage. John Lennon said “the love you make is equal to the love you take’. Are you romantic to your girlfriend. If you amp it up a bit you might find reciprocal overtures from her. At least that’s what my girlfriend said when I asked her what she thought of your dilemma.
Romance is more the poetry and art of love, where as love is more long lasting and comfortable. The chemical reactions of new love can have the same attributes as romantic love. Statistics show that the average relationship lasts 3.9 years, about the same amount of time that dopamine influences the passion in our love affairs. After that one needs to be sufficiently grounded in a true partnership or develop other satisfying elements in the relationship to offset the loss of the novelty of the dopamine driven love affair.
I would also ask myself how am I, in any way, contributing to the loss of romance? Act on your romantic feelings with overtures that are both inviting and personal. Talk to her about your feelings and needs. Threats never work to provoke romance. Being vulnerable, however, does sometimes work. No other emotion or action seems to be confined or restrained to other people’s morality as much as love.
Romance may not last, but marriage might not last either. The CDC http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_23/sr23_028.pdf states that he current marriage rate is 6.8% per 1000 people. The divorce rate is exactly 50% at 3.4 per 1000 people.
Can you think of her/oic and or marvelous adventures to blend into your love life? Love letters, love poems, love rituals involving trips, gifts and loving acts are all venues for romance. Being interested is the first step, but being intoxicated with love is the romantic goal. Be the romance you want to receive. Romance is a higher octave that elevates love to a form of art. If love be music - play on. Happy Valentine’s Day, the best gifts are not necessarily flowers, or jewelry but the memories made that you fondly reminisce about later.
Love,
Sappho