The assumption of true love according to the short nonfiction story by Mira Jacobs is not necessarily in its physical demonstration of affection by kissing, fondling or hugging by couples but in tolerating one another. The author narrates the relationship between her parents that are of mutual understanding without quarrel, disagreement or public display of affection even when their partnership was predetermined according to the Indian culture. This is indifferent to Americans where a couple dates for quite a period of time before getting into marriage. Her parents have no display of romance for a better part of their marriage unlike the love stories played in movies and the relationships with Americans. At a point, her Surgeon father suggested to her that when partners are not passionate to each other, they hardly get disappointed by the flaws of one another.
This comparison is in line with the first assumption of love where it survives amid the different perceptions of a couple. The Indian couple is of different backgrounds, perceptions, and character but fate puts them together to ultimately fall in true love. In relation to romance, it can be argued that the realization of love brings about a passionate intimate feeling that is mutually allowing the display of affection (Berlant, 2000).
However, they later develop the mutual liking for one another and start acting in romantic ways unlike her expectations and to what the family has been tuned to over the years. The parents become closer to even hold each other in public, flirt and even share the same car to parties unlike before. Even when upon fighting, they cry to each other. It in this moment that they become passionate and find a new realization of each other’s feelings of being together.
Upon her visit, she realizes what true love really means to even break up in her ‘untrue’ relationship and slowly falls in love where she gets married. Earlier in the relationship, she does not display her true self and figures out issues on her own preferring to share with Arun his brother, close acquaintances or even strangers in the bar before talking out to the boyfriend, Jed. During the period her boyfriend is away in Nigeria for a film shootout, she realizes how intimate she truly is and gets worked up when they don’t talk for 3 days and even cries.
Her story identifies with the second assumption of love where there has to be the first instance of attraction between two persons in order for the existence of love without which, there can never be any mutual intimate feelings (Sternberg, 2006). She developed an attraction towards Jed from the first go so strong that however much she wanted to resist, it was not in her control. In the second story, the end of the affair, a couple goes out to the movies to watch Graham Greene novel adaptation. The narrator is not engaged to the screen unlike the partner, Hugh who gets emotional and sobs because of the scenes playing. The love story between Ralph Fiennes and Julianne Moore in the movie was hanging in the balance until when the bombs fall off and she dies. The narrator and Hugh have been together for over 10 years and over time they hardly displayed any intimate feelings of passion or romance but still, she would not think about being with another man. After leaving the theatre, they get coffee in a nearby cafeteria when she realizes that in as much as Hugh never displayed affection openly, he is moved by the movie and proves how much he feared to lose her for death. She then perceives true love not expressed in the outward physical things but on a person’s internal feelings.
Her story is also true in line with the third assumption of love where a couple falls in love because of a deep understanding of the true self of the partner. The narrator, even when they don’t display actual physical romance, they stay together for many years and she is satisfied with the partnership fully. They demonstrate how much they understand each other with tolerance in their reactions thus romance and intimacy to them is internal.
Works Cited
Berlant, Lauren Gail, ed. Intimacy. University of Chicago Press, 2000.
Sternberg, Robert J., and Karin Weis, eds. The new psychology of love. Yale University Press, 2006.
