6 Apr 2005
Lost in Transition?
"Do you love me?" Marthe asked suddenly.
Mersault burst out laughing. "Now that's a serious question."
"Answer me!"
"People don't love each other at our age, Marthe - they please each other, that's all. Later on, when you are old and impotent, you can love someone. At our age, you just think you do. That's all it is."
- An excerpt from A Happy Death by Albert Camus
How true! How true! Camus is a genius.
Love: a four-letter word used by everybody to package the combination of the egress of biological instinct and obsession for psychological security, and a wholly selfish emotion in the form of a most expansive state of mind. A socially-endorsed, culturally-imposed drug that, aided by art and literature, sustains immaturity across generations inebriated with delusion. Without doubt, the most misconstrued and exploited word after God.
It's a painful realisation - for anyone who does realise - that nobody really loves but everybody believes he does. Love - that gift from heaven - have we lost it somewhere on our road to civilization? Or, was it never there at all? A bad turn. Worse, we don't even realise it!
Current Mood: Happy
Current Music: Ilaiyaraja-apostrophe-s instrumentals
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