Love Hostages
Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn’t it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses. You build up a whole armor, for years, so nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life… You give them a piece of you. They didn’t ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn’t your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like ‘maybe we should be just friends’ or ‘how very perceptive’ turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It’s a soul-hurt, a body-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. Nothing should be able to do that. Especially not love. I hate love.
—Rose Walker, in “The Sandman”
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That passage really gets you in the gut doesn’t it?
Great point, the downside of love is pretty awful. it’s the same in all relationships, for example, all of the emotional blackmail that goes on in friendships. I think when these things pop up in relationships it’s because the person who brings them to the relationship really didn’t like you or love you anyway. Narcissists are really good at screwing up relationships because they really don’t love or like anyone else anyway.
Your post raises a great issue, all relationships are complicated and not for the faint of heart.
I’m starting to wonder if my heart is becoming too battered, and if I should just give up. The universe seems to be telling me I should be alone.
Much easier said than done. Don’t give up, the right person will come along. All of the cliches are true… There is someone for everyone. In the meantime, enjoy the scenery, rent but don’t buy and make them win your heart.ππ
Thanks BTP! You’re the bestest! π
Love Sandman. And just about everything Neil Gaiman writes.
I have American Gods on my kindle, and am planning on reading it soon. I tried Neverwhere, but couldn’t get into it, so American Gods was suggested to me.
Have you read Good Omens? That was my first and it’s a great gateway drug. LOL
American Gods is really good too.
Neverwhere is the only one I’ve tried. I came across that quote the other day when I googled something. It was something I needed to read at that moment. π
Fuck love.
Basically. Lol