Topic Meme: Day 11

[nanila]

soliano requested I witter about: Romance.

Oh my. I have a peculiar relationship with Romance. Some of my favourite comfort reads fit the exhaustively overdone Romantic trope of two heterosexual persons who meet under stressful circumstances, don’t really like one another at first, then fall in love and the whole thing winds up with some manner of stupidly spectacular wedding a grand total of three weeks later.

This is not a thing I can recall wanting myself. Even with my very first relationship which looked on course to follow said trope (right down to the high school sweethearts part in modern versions), that’s not the ending I desired, because I had my sights set on top universities and multiple degrees. The whirlwind aspect of romance never appealed.

I’m also not an expensive wedding in a white dress kind of person. Having participated as a bridesmaid in a few of those, I must say I don’t see the point. It’s a lot of planning and money for an event that most frequently seems to be predominantly stressful for the persons who are supposed to be having the time of their lives.

For me, neither the adrenaline rush of first attraction nor the public celebration of commitment have much to do with romance. Expensive gift-giving does, mostly because of the planning and saving up on behalf of another person required to execute it. Other things I find romantic include:

• Spooning
  
• Cups of tea brought when needed, not just when requested
  
• Bacon sandwiches on hangover mornings
  
• Enthusiasm for using a long sit-down in the pub as a reward for achieving just about anything
  
• Ridiculous private nicknames
  
• A good intellectual row, followed by kissing
  
• An unequivocal “Yes” in reply to “Can I interest you in bed-related shenanigans?”

I feel bad for Romance since it often gets used in a derogatory manner to describe associations that are either cliched, inaccurate or both, when in fact it is one of the greatest things about love.

Comments

[kaberett]

Crap, now I want to stay up all night rereading Pride & Prejudice. (Also: romance can be quite possibly either getting entirely distracted by, or making really bad jokes about, science during bed-related shenanigans. It is a thing I am enjoying a lot at the moment.)

[nanila]

Also: romance can be quite possibly either getting entirely distracted by, or making really bad jokes about, science during bed-related shenanigans. It is a thing I am enjoying a lot at the moment.

Yep. Yep, that's a good one, that is. :D

[hunningham]

Ah, nice to find someone else who just does not get the Big White Wedding thing. Over the years H. (my partner) has had so much grief about this - we're an unmarried hetero couple and people just assume that I am desperate (gagging) to have that special day and since we're not married, it must be because the man is unwilling to commit. They'll corner him and offer well-meant un-helpful advice. Argh.

[nanila]

Argh indeed. My sympathies to you both for having to sit through it.

It seems that those who feel the need to offer such advice will always offer it to the male person in a hetero couple, and will offer apologies or (unwanted) sympathy to the female person. It never occurs to them that if I were so desperate to have that special day, I would've done the proposing and planning of it myself. I'm not exactly one to sit round and wait for other people to do things that I want for me.