17 Comments
User's avatar
sixes's avatar

Thanks Clint and Conrad. I'm glad to hear that you're falling asleep texting ๐Ÿณ๏ธโ€๐ŸŒˆ๐ŸŒˆ๐ŸŽต๐ŸŽถโค๏ธ๐Ÿงก๐Ÿ’›๐Ÿ’š๐Ÿ’™๐Ÿ’œ๐ŸคŽ๐Ÿ–ค๐ŸŽถ๐ŸŽต๐ŸŒˆ๐Ÿณ๏ธโ€๐ŸŒˆ

DougT's avatar

Wishing you all the best on your new awakening......whatevers. For me my solo Ivory Towers life suits me. No one depending on me, I don't need to be in the Liars and Let Down club to anyone. I've had the best of the best in the past and I can't ever see it happening again ๐Ÿค” so I'm not looking. I'm a real miserable ๐Ÿด๓ ง๓ ข๓ ฅ๓ ฎ๓ ง๓ ฟ๐Ÿ‡ฌ๐Ÿ‡ง old git. Cheers DougT ๐Ÿด๓ ง๓ ข๓ ฅ๓ ฎ๓ ง๓ ฟ๐Ÿ‡ฌ๐Ÿ‡ง

Tom Savignano's avatar

How many people know that Francis Bacon the painter and Sir Francis Bacon were born on the same day?

Thanks for your lists, Clint.

Queer Resilience's avatar

I very much relate to this. Andโ€ฆat age 46โ€ฆdare I say it โ€œout loudโ€โ€ฆI think I finally recently met โ€œmy person.โ€ And he feels the same way. Iโ€™ll probably get around to writing about it eventually but for now, I am just enjoying the magic and connection that I wasnโ€™t sure existed for me

Diana from Sloppyperfect's avatar

What a beautiful synchronicity. Yesterday I came across a quote by Carl Jung and it's been on my mind since: โ€œTo love someone else is easy, but to love what you are, the thing that is yourself, is just as if you were embracing a glowing red-hot iron: it burns into you, and that is very painful. Therefore, to love somebody else in the first place is always an escape which we all hope for, and we all enjoy it when we are capable of it. But in the long run, it comes back on us. You cannot stay away from yourself forever, you have to return, have to come to that experiment, to know whether you really can love. That is the question โ€” whether you can love yourself, and that will be the test.โ€ โ€” Carl Jung

Clint Collide's avatar

What a great quote, Diana. Thank you for sharing it! Cheersโ€ฆ

Lee's avatar
20hEdited

Thanks, Clint. Love! Egad! Great for those who love it. It's taken me 50 years to learn to be open about being a natural loner. As a four-times married woman in my family said not long before her death: "I'm a slow learner, but I finally got it. I've had the CURE." She died contentedly single. Me, too: two cats and peace and quiet. For those in the game: cheers, go for it--all the best!

Lee

Clint Collide's avatar

As a loner myself, I totally understand your pov, Lee. But as a natural-born lover, I do have the urge to connect with others on a variety of levels. One of these days, I hope to meet someone to share those varietals with. Like some good wines! :-) Until then, Iโ€™m a happy-go-lucky loner. Just banging on my drum and strumming my ukele. Even when I miss the beat and forget to tune my uke! :-p Cheers!

Lee's avatar

I am so there. I cry at romantic songs like nobody's business. I'm a huge Mark Weigle fan, Jane Olivor fan, "Tales of the City," all so, so good. Carly Simon singing "In the wee small hours of the morning." So, so good.

Clayton Emmer, OFS's avatar

There are so many different notions of love on offer in our culture.

I think many of them hint at the reality, but only as through a glass, darkly. Many of them come by way of marketing campaigns, and commercial music, movies and television. These definitions are by nature suspect, because they are generated by an industry (advertisement) that needs to sell us on the fact that we donโ€™t have what we need. As a result, for those of us who are single, it may be tempting to consider love, in this season of life, as a spectator sport. Keep the pursuit going, the marketers tell us: download this app, create this profile, curate this image, etc. etc. etc.

It might be worth stopping for a moment to interrogate our own definition of love. Maybe we are coming up short because we have locked onto a definition of love that is inadequate to the reality.

For myself, I donโ€™t believe that love is a spectator sport. It isnโ€™t a commodity or a Colgate commercial. As Dostoevsky once observed, โ€œlove in reality is a harsh and dreadful thing compared to love in dreams.โ€ Love is not an acquisition, but a gift received. This is difficult, but hopeful, news: Love is never outside of my reach, because self-donation is never outside of reach. But we need a lover who can show us what it means to love.

https://open.substack.com/pub/doxaweb/p/the-meaning-of-communion-515

Clint Collide's avatar

As a former member of several marketing teams at several entertainment companies, I know how easily love can be commodified. So I subscribe to the definition I learned early on, as a child, watching Leo Buscalgia on PBS:

โ€œLove is always bestowed as a gift - freely, willingly and without expectation. We don't love to be loved; we love to love.โ€

Leo Buscalgia

https://www.brainyquote.com/authors/leo-buscaglia-quotes

Michael Horvich's avatar

Clint, Tender thoughts! Fondly, Michael

Clint Collide's avatar

Yeah, itโ€™s a gray, hazy day here in SoCal. Feeling the loveโ€ฆcheers!

Michael Horvich's avatar

Cheers back. In Chicago, it is USUALLY gray, hazy and add SNOWY day. Fondly, Michael

Clint Collide's avatar

Well, I hope to visit one day soon. The Windy City is filled with too much art Iโ€™ve never had the time to see when Iโ€™ve been in town on business. Year ago. So Iโ€™m noodling on visiting sooner than later, likely in the early fall. Maybe I can take the train up your way and treat you to lunch. Cheers!

Michael Horvich's avatar

That would be lovely. Or I could meet you at a museum and we could do lunch from there.

Clint Collide's avatar

Donโ€™t threaten me with a good time. Iโ€™d move into The Art Institute if I could. More details when I have them. First, I need to get myself in shape for all the walking and discovering I wanna do!