The History of Love

In joining my brother's 52 in 52 challenge and in an attempt to do right by him, I finally decided to finish a book which was stalled on page 14 for about two years now (follow-through was never my strong suit)--keeping in mind that the book is a mere 250-ish pages in length. Should've taken me about three days to read cover-to-cover. Three years later, I read the final exerpt, closed the book, and immediately sat in awe of Nicole Krauss (the author, to state the obvious).

Let's start with favorite quotes, of which there are many:

1. "And if the man who once upon a time had been a boy who promised he'd never fall in love with another girl as long as he lived kept his promise, it wasn't because he was stubborn or even loyal. He couldn't help it."

2. "Herman Cooper was an eighth-grade nightmare who lived on our block and called everyone Penis." (because calling people "Penis" is funny. And, yes, I'm 24 years old and think this is hillarious)

3. "I was a small part of something larger than myself."

4. "The insoluble contradiction of being animals cursed with self-reflection, and moral beings cursed with animal instincts."

5. "As the rifles were pointed at his chest he wondered if what he had taken for the richness of silence was really the poverty of never being heard."

6. "'I could learn Russian.' Misha nodded and said 'I'll teach you. First word. Dai. Second word. Ruku.' 'What does it mean?' 'Say it first.' 'Dai ruku.' Misha took my hand."

7. "A thought crossed his face in a language I couldn't understand."

and, finally...

8. "And part of you was drawn to her, and a part of you resisted--wanting to ride off on your bicycle, kick a stone, remain uncomplicated. In the same breath you felt the strength of a man, and a self-pity that made you feel small and hurt. Part of you thought: please don't look at me. If you don't, I can still turn away. And part of you thought: Look at me. And though you were grown up you felt as lost as a child. And though your pride was broken, you felt as vast as your love for her. She was gone, and all that was left was the space where you'd grown around her, like a tree grows around a fence...If it weren't for her, there would never have been an empty space, or the need to fill it...spoiling for him anyone who could ever come after her."

I know it's a lot. Some of it may not make much sense to random readers (assuming people are reading this). The moral of the story? Not sure just yet. But it got me thinking about love and fate and what is true. Is there only one for every one? Can you love many? Is love a choice? More importantly, when we feel something so strongly, why do some of us humans find it so difficult to speak it directly? Why do some of us shy away from it--that which resounds so deeply within our souls? This book is filled with love, pure and true--simple yet complicated. And heartbreak. And questions that cannot be answered with words; yet part of us, on a deeper level, knows the answer. We feel it more than we can ever speak it.

I'm currently struggling through my very first "love," you could say (and yes, this is my very first hint of something real at the ripe old age of 24). It's an incredible adjustment, yet some part of me needs no adjusting. It's my mind that gets in the way...that forces the rationalization of something that cannot, or maybe should not, be rationalized. Or maybe it can be, and maybe it should be.

I think this book ultimately poses the question of truth...in relation to love specifically, but it can be expanded to life in general. The truth that can only be understood. Nothing spoken, nothing rationalized, just felt. Known on some deeper level. Like looking at a sunset or hearing the wind through the trees or the ocean against the sand. It's a truth of life that words fail.

And yet. There are hundreds of thousands of millions of book dedicated to it. To truth. Words are simply one means of reaching something that can never be spoken. For some, yoga is a means to reach that end. For others, it's writing. For others, it's reading. Maybe it's a combination of it all.

And maybe we'll never really know.

Or maybe we already do.