Crashing in love

Is romance really over? Modern times have given way to more modern vices and virtue has become almost virtual. It is a simulacrum of Edith Wharton times (more like “Whoreton”) these days. We pretend to still embrace the values of our forefathers — patience, kinship, solidarity and chastity — things that made them seem mythical in our susceptible eyes. We want to be mythologized, too. But how?

How many friends have I seen flushed with lust over a night of cavorting with destiny in a nightclub (and then some) only to be left with a wake of  disastrous fault lines ranging from: “He never called me back” to “He never left my apartment and he’s still there making long-distance calls and ordering food using my account.” Then the quake comes, leaving self-esteem and whatever’s left of one’s romantic self buried in the rubble.

I realize that romance has gone the way of Larry Flynt rather than Shakespeare. No more longing, no more tears, no more battles before unwrapping the petticoat. This all usually comes after and it’s called “psycho stalking.” Restraint is now replaced by a restraining order. I knew this was the case when I read a 10-page feature in a popular women’s magazine about “Waiting for Sex” — meaning, getting his name, number of siblings, etc. before doing the nasty. There were testimonials such as, “It felt so good because we waited for two weeks! It really makes a difference.” I guess knowing the man’s name is a veritable aphrodisiac. It devoted 10 pages to reasons why you should operate like a human being and not hook up like a rabbit whose tail is red-hot with embers. I consider myself quite liberal in some cases, but I simply could not believe my eyes when what I thought was the norm had actually become more and more the exception.

I asked a female friend in the hook-up capital of the world, New York, what led her to be a primary target reader for such a persuasive 10-page feature. Beautiful, witty and sharp, she told me that people had no time to date in New York. I reminded her that she currently had no job and was in the wife-in-waiting cottage industry of creating little purses for little stores in Soho. “Well, the guys don’t on my side,” she said defensively. “Everyone is just in the office day in and out, it’s not like France where you can have three-week-long holidays and fall in love. People just don’t have time for it here. The dudes who do, usually suck,” she speaks in an ever so-Socratic manner. She is now 30 and panicking ever so slightly. I think beneath her wanton lifestyle as a modern-day coquette, she believes that the lightning of a whirlwind romance will hit her. I think that’s the hope of every modern romantic without much paid vacation leave.

I have my doubts regarding the whirlwind. I have had a few friends who have been blessed with its speed and accuracy but many have been left crushed and pillaged by its ever-so-naughty sleight of hand. I have had many friends who take their hot randoms to South America or Thailand for a vacay only for them to come home silently cussing about the water, the bad resort food and the sunburns. What they’re really not saying is that their companion was the biggest bug of all. Some have actually cultured their bugs into relationships. With fights and all. It usually ends when someone says “I love you.” Imagine the irony, since those three little words have been classically evoked to start a romance.

In the modern Waterloo of romance, Facebook, people of all kinds of sensibilities find themselves tossed into awkward positions. It’s the Kama Shit-ra. Another beautiful friend of mine from London found her dream man during a setup while visiting  (again) New York. He was a dashing theater heir, she was a sizzling TV personality. Together they acted like a true couple in love. Then my “besotted” friend blinked and changed her relationship status to “In a relationship.” The tragic denouement hit when the guy stayed glaringly “Single” in his profile. The product of virtue, which is true love, has found its way into the trash bin of virtual romance. Either way, with her long blonde hair and jade green eyes, it didn’t take long for her to find a lover who eventually changed his status in Facebook for her. He lives in California, while she lives in London. I guess they are really doing everything it takes these days to stay in a real relationship. Changing status without changing their lifestyles, that is. As my friend Chut says, “If it’s on Facebook it must be true.”

Now, with the new format, everyone’s Facebook friends can comment on one’s transition from being “in an open relationship” to “it’s complicated.” I guess complications take modern relationships to another level, otherwise I’m lost.

 With all these histrionics going on I took a love sabbatical last year. I’ve had my own share of sad stories, enough to give me the moral authority to criticize controversial modern romances. Though I won’t vow to hold out E.M. Forster-style, there is luxury and an undeniable beauty in having something old-fashioned instead of something new.

 While visiting India, I learned that people had a system of getting together there. They would hang out as a group, coyly eye one another and when they were “sure,” they would more boldly have dinner in public places and be branded as a couple. This can’t happen often as the girl may gain a less-than-flattering reputation. Oftentimes, they can’t even travel together, which is a practice that my whirlwind international mile-high friends may try to consider. However practical and heartbreak-free it may sound, I still want to fall in love without an instruction manual.

 Sadly, there’s no formula. Just a belief in yourself is needed. Love yourself and love will come to you like Amy Winehouse to a crack pipe. Then it won’t matter what Facebook says.