“The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love...and be loved in return.” For some time now I’ve wanted to talk about love; I’ve danced around it some, but for the most part, in written word and real life it seems, I’ve pretty much just been a wallflower.
I can hear that voice sing-saying that quote in the beginning of Moulin Rouge … Toulouse was it?
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“What have I got to lose?” the wallflower asks herself pondering her reflection in the mirror.
“There is pride, but perhaps hope has a place since it allegedly comes before the fall and I could fall …” she said, idly twirling her hair.
But there are tears to lose, the threat of heartache to gain, neither of which the wallflower believed could be any worse than her present pain.
“This is no life. This is no fun at all,” she said, feeling stuck on love’s sideline waiting for her number to be called.
“Surely there is someone, somewhere, someone out there just for me. There has to be,” she cried because this world is full of possibilities.
And she was certain there was, believed it to be so and ever hopeful, she resigned her fate to that of luck. “Except I’m rarely lucky,” she sighed. “Which means, I’ll probably wind up stuck.”
Then inside her mind the question arose, is it best to be stuck with someone or to just be stuck alone, to which the wallflower thought:
“But do not settle. We must never settle, and e’er believe the quest for true love to be, well, true,” she thought realizing that for some true love will be a quest and every quest has a clue.
Meanwhile, all around her, pretty, calligraphed invites seemed to wave and to dance, beckoning her to ceremonies boasting of eternity-filled love, togetherness and romance. Bloody gift seekers, she thought while sifting through their registries. Who the hell needs 8 (expensive) crystal glasses? Who have they to please?
“Oh no worries dear, pretty soon it’ll be your time,” come the ill-advised assurances spoken in tones oh so snide.
“My time?” she asks bewildered. “Since when was time ever mine? Time cannot be held, it cannot be owned, its keeper I cannot find.”
“Oh, all that is meant is that your chance, it will come soon,” say the backpeddlers to the wallflower whose head starts to swoon.
“It happens when you least expect it, just as you feel your heart is filled with doom. Love walks in, extends its hand and on the dance floor of romance, you will find it blooms.”
For now she just sits … against the wall, sometimes dancing in her chair; keeping time with her heart, hoping soon for love to be there.