something attractive

[7/27/14 1:10 pm]

although i don't talk about it very often in conversation, it's not unusual for the subject of romantic love/relationships to come up in my thoughts from time to time.

i am not the type of person to crush easily.  indeed, i've never been "in love" in any kind of deep or meaningful way (so... not really at all).  from time to time i toss around the question of if i would really know a romantic deep love if i experienced it... and considering my welcomeness to cross-gender platonic relationships, i'm not entirely sure i would distinguish it for quite a while.  i assume it would involve some kind of physical desire, and maybe a certain kind of jealousy... not quite sure what else.  my inexperience makes it so i can only speculate.  yet every time (recently) i examine a platonic relationship of mine, i've found little to no trace of any signs of romance at all (on my part, anyway).  but i've discovered that these unique friendships have taught me more about romance than i realized.

anyway, most recently, i wanted to get married someday, but for only one reason--that i wouldn't live alone for the rest of my life after college.  other than that, romance was about the same in my mind, and about as appealing, as any other relationship.  i was hoping other reasons would come eventually.  :)

but as my mind wandered yesterday, i found another reason.  people in a romantic relationship are expected to do things together, to hang out a lot, to prefer one another, to be together one-on-one, to have some degree of physical closeness.  to me none of those things would necessarily have to be unique to romantic relationships (depending on the nature and attitude of them, of course), but many would consider much of that outside of romance to be inappropriate.  being in a romantic relationship would give the freedom for those things without concern that someone would be alarmed.

there's something else, too.  i love the idea of having someone's arms available, someone's shoulder available if i need it, someone's ears, or just someone's smile and laugh.  the idea of getting married and having someone come into my life as a permanent addition, never to leave, who doesn't share my blood, is... very desirable, but also a bit difficult to wrap my head around.

i made a decision a while back not to date yet.  i still stand by that wholeheartedly, agreeing even more than i did before.  i had some fairly good reasons, but aside from those, and aside from other tensions that would inevitably result from my having a romantic friend at my stage in life, i found another really solid reason.  i have several platonic friendships (cross-gender) that are mutually unromantic, intense, and intensely satisfying.  and that would (and did) rip me to the core if anything looked like it would put them in jeopardy.  platonic.  some of those people are even in wonderful romantic relationships.

on one side (kind of like the other post):  what would it do to me if i were to enter into a romantic relationship and invest even more into it, only to have it fall apart like so many others of my age group?  i take relationships of almost all kind very seriously, but this would certainly reserve a special place that would possibly come close to destroying me if it went sour.  too high risk yet.

on the other side:  with platonic relationships of that caliber, i could never be satisfied with anything (or anyone) less, on a romantic level.  my friends have shown me, unintentionally perhaps, more specific things i'm looking for, that will be essential in a future spouse, and that such people do exist, if they are rare.  so i can (and will) afford to be picky.  :)