What Is Love?

Over the weekend I was asked to fill out a survey for a friend of friend's Sex and Society class. It was your standard fare, with questions about dating, expected time frames, etc., but one question stood out to me because it completely stumped me.

"What is love?"

It's such a simple question, but one I wound up having the hardest of times coming up with an answer. I wound up giving some lame, cop-out answer to wrap up the survey, but after doing so, I realized something...

Love is not only something that's hard to define, but something who's definition changes over time.

I've been in what I believed to be love twice. Once about 9 years ago and a second time a few years later. Other than the fact that I was involved, the two experiences couldn't have been any more different. Hell, even then, the fact that I was involved doesn't hold much water, because Terence at 17 was a completely different person from Terence at 20.

At 17, love was perfect and pure. I was completely innocent and purely naive, but it didn't matter. There was a girl I liked who liked me back and life couldn't have been any more grand. There wasn't a waking hour of the day that I wasn't thinking about her. I made her things and talked to her everyday on the phone and all that other sappy stuff. If you would have asked me what love was then, I would have written you the world's longest essay full of colorful adjectives and vibrant descriptions.

An essay that would have been promptly ripped to shreds the moment she broke my heart. Love was no longer bright and cheery as it now came with a dark, sad side to it. It wasn't ever going to be "perfect" again.

I held on to that ideal for a few years until a girl who was a close friend completely turned my definition of love around. Love no longer needed to be rooted in "perfection," as it did so much friendship. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on which side of the fence I want to be on), that friendship kept me from moving toward anything more with her. Do I have any regrets about that decision? Definitely. Would I go back and change anything? Probably not. Things happen for a reason...

But unrequited love aside, that "experience" (for lack of a better term) changed my outlook on what being in love was supposed to be like. The thing is, some 6 years later, I don't think I have those same exact expectations that come with being in love as I did before.

Is that a bad thing? No. Not at all. Actually, it may be a good thing as it keeps my previous perceptions from clouding any future emotions. While I'll never forget my "lessons learned," I've got no desire to relive them. Every girl is different. Every situation is different.

And sure, this puts me back at square one of trying to figure out "what is love," but that's cool. Trying to figure it out is half the fun. I don't know when I'll figure it out next, or with who, or where, but I do know that when it's time for me to find the answer, I'll know.