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Romance: Part Two

Editors note: please re-read Part One again.

M: But some people would say that that doesn’t sound like real life.

J: Of course it doesn’t. What happens in real life? Someone gets cancer and dies. Someone rejects you because your thighs are too big, your nose is too short. It’s all these expectations and judgments. We’ve been conditioned to see that it’s the goal, it’s the end game. It’s what does it look like after the romance. How many people say, “Oh yeah, romance is great but now we are married? Oh, I am married with children. Driver carries no cash, his wife has it all.” You know there are all these little things that support the belief that the romance at some point ends. Everyone wants a fairy tale ending but doesn’t believe it. Or people say, “Oh, that’s just a Hollywood ending. That’s Hollywood. It’s make believe.” Well, guess what? Your whole life is make believe. Why wouldn’t you make believe it in that way? I am with my beloved. Each second that I am with her is like a pit full of honey, dripping over each of our bodies. Rose petals falling from the sky. Moonlit walks. Tenderness that is so unbelievably excruciating in its tenderness. Is that make believe? Some people may say so. For me, it’s my life. That’s how I live my life. And that’s how I plan to live my life to the very last moment. And that romance is not with something outside of me. It’s with Life itself. It’s not focused just on my wife or my sons or my dog or my friends who agree with me. It’s focused on the entire thing that’s called LIFE. That thing that is coursing through everyone of us, moving through every tree, every plant. Every animal on this planet is alive in that way and it’s romance. It is romance. So say whatever you want to say. Say it’s not possible. That it ends after you get married. It ends after you have children. It ends after you get divorced. It ends with the angry client, the estranged sibling, the disappointed boss, the shitty economy and your vanishing wealth, your family of origin, the other side of the tracks you grew up in, the color of your skin. No. It never ends. And I’m here to tell you that. Ever. Unless you say it does. Unless you no longer want to live a romantic life. Don’t you see we choose. No one does that for us. Sure we all have valid reasons for being miserable, for being so unhappy. The litany of reasons is both long and varied. But when do we say, “I want this now before I die.” What if we really understood how unbelievably short our time here is? Wouldn’t we spend every possible second seeking out the honey like a little bear cub? Some of you in the audience are most certainly wondering if this doesn’t sound like some ecstasy fueled fantasy. That I must certainly get angry, yell at the kids, wake up grumpy, have my bad days. Absolutely. But what I also do is remember what the ecstasy feels like and seek to go back there. What being out of Romance with Life feels like. Let me tell you this. It feels like crap. And the more I’m in that romantic place the better I get at getting myself back there when I fall of the horse. Sure it happens. So what? What are you going to judge me for taking myself out of the honey pit? Do you judge yourself? What if for once you didn’t? What would happen? Would the big ol’ Wizard of Oz be exposed? An old man pulling levers behind a façade? Nothing there substantial at all? The honey of Romance is what’s substantial my friends. I have no doubt whatsoever. Now where is your doubt? Where is your faith?

Close your eyes for a moment and just imagine the exhilarating feeling of loving yourself and everything outside of you so much that your whole being is shimmering and light. What about it? What are we waiting for…?

M: (sigh)

END.

Enjoy the sweetness.

Love to you all,
J

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