Wednesday: Light up the Empire State Building

When ever I think of the Empire State Building, I flash to the movie Sleepless in Seattle. A couple sit having a romantic dinner on Valentine's Day. The Empire State Building is in silhouette behind them and a huge heart is in illuminated by red lights. Romance.


I love romance. I love candle-lit romantic dinners with soft jazz playing in the background. I love receiving flowers and little presents that say I love you. And I most definitely love "chick flicks" that honor the concept of love overcoming obstacles as two soul mates finally are brought together to live happily ever after.


I guess the major troubles in life are created when we take romance out of life and are caught into the mundane issues of maintaining a life that is safe and secure. I have nothing against safety and security and in fact know that if we do not have these things we would be fighting just to survive. There is no romance in survival. However, why is it that in living happily ever after Cinderella goes back to being a scullery maid and waiting on Prince Charming and washing endless dishes, cooking endless meals, sweeping and dusting surfaces that just get dirty again, and in the meantime going out to bring home the bacon so she can fry it up in a pan only to begin again in the morning after less sleep than she had when she ran home from ball when the clock struck twelve and she lost her glass slipper.


From the time our hormones start to create the urge to procreate till the day we take our last breath, we are driven to desire romance. Yet with such a strong drive which is the fancy clothes that we put on passion and lust, why do we let it smolder like an ember on a cold hearth.


Those who are supposedly wise suggest that as we settle into our lives we should give up on the desires of youth and accept that being content is enough. That doesn't sound very wise to me. I mean I have often bought into that piece of aging dogma but I can tell you it is not as much fun as I feel in my heart that life should be.


So today, I will put on some romantic music - perhaps listen to My Funny Valentine, light a candle and remember the romantic interludes in my life when content was the last thing in the world that I ever desired. In fact, I may go rent every chick flick at Blockbuster and have a fantasy night. Maybe before I make it to rent those movies, my husband will show up with flowers and tell me that I am beautiful. It could happen. That is what is truly wonderful about romance it brings hope that anything can happen especially the excitement of love the second time around.


Pardon me a minute, that was the phone ringing....




It was my husband, he just called to say he loved me. I guess romance is not dead.