l'amour continue

The cruise ship, the first few hotels in Europe and California, and the temporary house where they lived until it was time to move —all those places witnessed the awestruck first months of their engagement until the enchanted fairytale gave way to a more mature relationship. The wistful carelessness of blooming romance fled, replaced by desire to learn more and grow closer. Neither lost in the dream, nor betrayed by fantasy, their bond grew stronger nourished by understanding and compassion. As life moved forward, love endured.

Affection grew with long conversations about nothing and everything, when the logic fails and mundane become the substance of life, by way of warm care toward each other, by way of grieving the same meaninglessness events, appeciating all things honorable and laughing at all things absurd.

With time, they learned of each other's mood swings and discovered each other’s hidden facets of personalities.  In a few months, he discovered that she was a woman of incredible drive and passion for all things imaginative that fueled her with insatiable energy mingled with moments of nervoussness and fatigue. Putting her imagination to good use by writing songs and poems, she saw the world in hidden ways and derived great pleasure from communicating her ideas to him. He had never met anyone with so many diverse ideas that changed daily and made it difficult for him to be objective.

She learned quickly that her fiancée was a man of unusual sensibilities. Attuned to her feelings, he was able to sense her moods just by listening to her. He was a man of contadiction – strong and confident in his decision making, he was stubborn in need for love and affection too, and above all, required reassurance. Though attracted to her new ideas, he was not ready to change his thinking unless she convinced him logically that it was for the best. Diplomatic in his requests, he taught her to speak with greater care and select kinder words towards him. Her reaction to his urges for affection stirred neither antipathy nor feeling of adoration, but a certain sense of curious belonging to someone completely. Herself with a careless need for personal space, she was unable to understand his need of constant reassuring words, but enjoyed a new play of spirited responsibility that moved her to great regard and care and secured his mind while fueling his spirit.



There came a day when other people became interesting to her again; there came a day when he learned that he could live a month without seeing her. Yet, knowing that they could survive without one another forced them to crave closeness with deeper intensity. All sweet things, honeyed with deference at night and renewed by morning with a new pledge of affection formed a bond made of pure care and kindness.

Love, flying on the wings of commitment and riding on the wheels of fantastic roundevous, brought them together in the south and saw them off on a trip up north  through chaotic airports, by way of economy seats and rented cars, by rides on big highways and small country roads, through the capital and countryside, towards the world of imaginative childhood in Disneyworld, past the hot and radiant sun of the Florida coast and back towards the humidity of Texas.