How can you
say that I don’t know what love is?
If I were a love song, I’d probably be Fleetwood
Mac’s No questions Asked. Most wouldn’t consider it the most prolific
love song ever recorded. But I do. It’s a song that so poignantly delves into the
realities of love and desire, and even on a more instinctual level, survival. It’s not soft and sexy. It’s not sweet and tender. No
Questions Asked is honest and relatable.
It’s not just a love song. It’s a life song. It’s a song about how we live. The struggles between loving someone and
loving yourself and wanting to be loved by others. The lyrics don’t reflect the action of making
love, but instead, the longing to be loved.
On our own terms and on our own agenda.
Of course. Because we cannot
accept the love of others unless they love us the way we have outlined.
I’m
frightened and I’m lost
But isn’t that what we all want? To love and be loved on our own terms? Isn’t that how we are conditioned to live and
love? Don’t we all want to dictate our
own futures; our own outcomes? We want
to be in control. We want to be able to
manipulate the products of our existence.
We want to own the successes and the failures. As a result of our desire for success being
more than that of defeat, we try to minimize the variables. Therefore, the people we chose to share our
road with, are those we are most vulnerable to; with those people, you have no
other option than to be yourself. And in
a world as superficial as ours, being vulnerable is really fucking scary.
Night after
night
Night after night. No questions asked. I affirm my belief that I am happy being
alone. I remind myself that being alone
is safe. I like the solitude. I like that I don’t have to answer to
others. I like that my bed is my own. I like that until I remember that I chose an
empty bed to punish myself. Then, night
after night, I’m torn between loving my empty bed and wondering if there were
arms around me, if I would appreciate it more or less. Night after night, I climb into bed on the
side closest to the window. I wake up
several times a night, when I cross the imaginary line that separates my side
from the other side of the bed. When I
have realized that I have crossed the line in my own bed, I will get up, take a
Benadryl and swallow a cup of water.
Then I’ll go back to the east side of the room; the far side of the
bed.
Pushed up against
the wall
We can’t ever have a relationship that we feel
stifled in. We can’t ever love if we
feel pushed up against the wall. I realized
at a very young age, that suffocating your lover, or being suffocated by your
lover doesn’t make you close. It makes
you want to escape. Being watched and
controlled only makes you want to find a way to emit from what binds you. When you feel cornered, the first response to
be free of the discomfort, of the threat.
The instinct to retreat is how we survive. By being alone, we either become independent
or we become sociopaths. We can isolate ourselves
from others in order to shield ourselves or save ourselves. It’s a very thin line that separates love of
self from love of others. I line just as
thin, separates us from loving ourselves and being loved by others.
Need you
now
Being alone only gets you so far. All the money…All the independence…All the indifference
only means something when you have something to prove. I spent years alone. Not independent, but alone. I was convinced that was where I needed to
be. It’s only been in the last year or
so, that I have realized the difference.
We should all be independent. We
should all be able to take care of ourselves.
But we should never be alone.
Sometimes we want to be alone, but we should also
be willing to accept that we need to not be by ourselves. Sometimes, you just need to say “I need you
now.” That’s what survival is
about. That’s how you live life. The people who love you will come through for
you. Your friends. Your family.
Your lovers. They will be there
for you and know that there are no expectations. No questions asked.
-Inner Peas
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