A’s pointless chatter

We are sitting at a downtown Vienna cafe where we met for brunch, the lady who was hired to musically accentuate the scene renders her 10th repetition of the same tune. Not purposely, as she had arrived here with a repertoir of various songs, but we can’t help thinking that they all melt into the same set of keys. Eventually we decide to part, sometimes it is just better not to prolong your own misery.

Next pit stop, a cafe in the first, and I am introduced to Parisian coffee. This gigantic mug in front of me resembles more of a soup bowl than anything else and however much I struggle with its content, the liquid just does not seem to disappear. About an hour later I give up and we move on to see Prime.
A movie about love against the background of age difference, and the problems unfold once we find out that our protagonist’s young lover is at the same time her therapist’s son.
One line in the movie goes like this: “Love is not enough, a relationship requires work.”
While I do agree with that, I also have to object and say it is a very essential ingredient. If work outweighs love, the benefit of the liasion becomes questionable.
No one is perfect and in the end perfection lies in loving the imperfection of the other. Yet most people don’t seem to live fulfilling relationship, they settle for familiarity, comfort and habit. Those qualities are not necessarily unimportant but they do not replace love, which is probably why those relationships never seem complete.
It is hard to break habits, good or bad.
A long time ago I read The Art of Loving by Erich Fromm. He set out to illustrate the difference between owning and having in love, and in his eyes most modern relationships are rather based on the former where the other is owned and dominated, whereas unconditional love can only come about if it is nurtured by freedom. His notion seems a tad too idealized to me, but I do think he has some valid points. Whereas people are often loved because of a collection of traits and aspects, real love to me encompasses the person as a whole. While the former is rigid and hardly leaves room for change, the latter allows people to grow and develop further.
Love should not require the other to be shaped and formed to fit our needs and desires. We might try to change each other and partialy succeed, but often the outcome is less satisfying than initially expected. Then also the question is, who did we fall in love with to begin with, the actual person or our own ideal that we projected onto them?

I also don’t think the feeling of loss felt after the absence of a person is love. Past memories are often idealized and especially past relationships. Instead of loving what really was we tend to love what we think or wish that it was, thus chasing a never attained or attainable ideal. Love, on the other hand, is omnipresent, it just simply is.
I have lived many ups and downs in my life, probably because I refuse to settle and in a sense I may be an idealist. Certainly a recipe for disappointment, but at the end of the day I can say I have lived.
While most relationships are familiarty versus love I do believe the latter exists. I have not seen many living examples but a few I have.
I think what is important in the end, is that we are fully one with what we choose, our actions, who we are, our goals and the person we are with.