And wove, twue wove.....

Name that movie! Anyone?? :)

In high school, college, and probably for a year or two after college, I would have been categorized as a 'hopeless romantic'. Oh, the grand vision I had for my life and the soul mate I'd undoubtedly be sharing it with! If you had asked me if I thought there was one person meant for me, I would have given an unshakable 'yes' as my answer. And there was no doubt that I believed in grand gestures of romance. My expectations for love in my life were high--not that you could tell that from my actual relationships, but in my head, I thought that was what I wanted, what I needed, and what I would ultimately end up with if I was just patient enough.

It's funny how our perspectives change over time. Whether it was experience or maturity, or a combination of both, my views on love and its place in my life have significantly mellowed out. It's not that I don't expect love to include romance or adoration, but my over-the-top daydreams have evolved into a more realistic picture. I must have watched way too much TV and way too many movies growing up, because it took a good long while and a lot of heartache for me to understand that being in love did not mean fireworks 24/7, it did not mean roses and gifts, and big speeches about how much he loved me and how wonderful I am. Sure, these things are part of a good relationship, but they're not the most important parts, not by a longshot.

Eventually, and I don't think I can pinpoint exactly when or what experience acted as the catalyst for this epiphany, but I realized those things didn't hold a candle to unconditional love, security, and comfort. Be careful not to confuse comfort with complacency, because they are very different things.

I don't talk about the boyfriend that often, and quite frankly, I consider that a good thing. I think I tend to talk the most about a person or situation when I'm a little insecure about him/it. Of course I'll talk about him with my family and friends--we did this, we talked about that, we disagreed about this--but never once have I felt the need to defend our relationship to anyone, and I can honestly say my intuition is not sending me 'red flag' warnings (I tend to ignore my gut feeling the most). Ok, so I did freak out a bit when we hit six months and when we shifted from the 'honeymoon' phase to the 'oh, yeah, we're real people with imperfections and this really is hard work' phase. I will admit to those little episodes, but give me a break, I'm a slightly neurotic individual who has a hard time accepting both bad AND good things that happen to me.

Not that I was analyzing why this relationship is just plain different from my past relationships, but I did have a moment a few weeks ago when I, all of a sudden, understood how my perspectives had changed and why the boyfriend had fulfilled those expectations. At the wedding in October, my friends were sharing romantic things their significant others or past SO's had done for them. It was my turn to talk about the most romantic thing the boyfriend had done for me. My answer was that he'd vigorously pursued me from the moment we met at that concert in the Blues Cafe in Jersey. He wasn't arrogant or cocky about it, he wasn't trying to play it cool. To him, it was very simple. I never had to guess whether or not he was really interested in me, he flat-out told me. Several times. As wonderful as all of that was/is, I wondered why I wasn't upset there hadn't been any grand gestures of romance, because according to past relationships, I wanted/needed that kind of thing. But for some reason, I didn't this time. Why?

It's slowly dawned on me that I actually don't need those things, at least not with him. I think the fact that I don't question our relationship, that I don't wonder when or if it'll all end has filled whatever void those former expectations used to leave. He holds my hand in the car, walking down the street or at the movies, he tells me he loves me all the time, we snuggle on the couch, and we fall asleep the same way. We talk about what bothers us, and when we've argued, we make sure to give each other the benefit of the doubt.

I'm sure some, if not all of this should just go without saying, nor do I mean to be mushy or cheesy about how 'perfect' our relationship is because it's not. I could list things we do that bug the crap out of each other, but why? People focus on the bad when the relationship is already on shaky ground and I'd much prefer to focus on the good. This also isn't to say that romantic things aren't good for relationships, or that those who do and appreciate grand gestures are wrong, I just think I've revised my own personal definition of romance. Give me my boyfriend's hand on the small of my back over flowers. Give me an email from my boyfriend about something good that happened to him over love letters, and give me 'I love you' said or whispered at random moments over presents of any kind. Those romantic gestures have come to mean the most to me. And that void I've felt in most other relationships? I haven't felt it yet, and I don't think I will.