LOve is it real or just a Disney concept ?

This has been a pet irritation of mine for some time. We are brought up on the idea that we find the love of our life, eyes meet, we kiss, we connect & live happily ever after - I mean you would have to be living in fantasy land to believe in this stuff....right ? Like I dare you to send me a story of a princess that has kissed the man of her dreams in some unpredictable movie like moment & lived happily every after....go on dare you !!
For women its if we just meet our mans needs, give him what he wants, let him believe he is the most important God forsaken person on the planet he will be happy......????? & we will feel "complete" WRONG Mr Cruise !!!
I've had a week, no a month, actually half a lifetime of it. Don't get me wrong...I love a chick flick like any other dreamer, but love..... what is love really ? If we listened to the writers, producers & actors, first you meet, then you dislike each other, then you realise your mistake, then you fight dragons & wars of half a lifetime, (not forgetting you miraculously keep your sexy good looks & trim taut physique throughout the many years that follow...this is afterall a fairytale) & after wasting most of your life aching for that one 'true love' you find them just in time for the death us do part section.
What is it about love, the OMG of some ridiculous lyrics that I am so over at present I turn off the radio to stop hearing it ? Is it the stuff that makes you go weak at the knees that good marketing would have you believe ? or is it that I have discarded faith & hope & replaced it with cynicism & contempt ? There is no denying human beings have more than a few weaknesses, one of which has made millions for cartoon fantasy movie writers & producers by selling the Abraham Maslow message that we each need to feel connected, a sense of belonging, to feel safe & loved to feel worthwhile....why?
Does that mean if we are unloveable, independent & fail to connect with our special someone we are hopeless ? may as well be written off ? or need to spend copious amounts of money in having a happily married til death do us part psychologist tell you what you need to change...whose only concept of heart break is the crusts weren't cut off their packed lunch that morning.
Nietzsche stated 'What doesn't kills us makes us stronger' - if this be true, then why aren't my biceps bigger ?
There are millions of books written on how to love, how to get the person of your dreams, how to change yourself, be a better person, be the person you are looking for....oooooh please, why can't we be OK the way we are (well some of us anyway)? It takes years to form these habits, to be as annoying as this...why change now ? :)
Maybe it truly is love that requires luck to keep many people hanging out to find what connects them to all that is good in their lives ? What if it is only once & what if we miss it ? What if they never feel the same ? Bugger ........ there is always writing to Juliet Capulet & waiting for one of her secretaries to tell you what you already know !
Love should be reserved for the committed, the dedicated, its a treasure, a gift, not everyone is fortunate to receive, why should it be wasted on people who toss it aside like brussel sprouts on a plate ? How many millions, no make that trillions of people each year ache for not knowing what it is like to be loved or to have truly loved with all your heart ? How many of those same people feel the same the following year ? When Noah said in the Notebook the best we can hope in all our life is to have loved someone with all your heart.....I loved this quote, yet thought my God only a man could say this - what is the point of giving all of yourself to someone who doesn't give it back ? Wouldn't the quote have been more disney like if it were that the gift in life is to be loved by someone with all their heart ? Maybe its late & this is all getting a bit wishy washy for me....What happened to respect ? Trust ? loyalty ? honesty ? compassion ? understanding ? committment ? ......Is love just an emotion, & most of the time a wasted one at that. Does it makes us stronger ? weaker ? more vulnerable ? If your heart breaks does it mend ?

What the romantic he meets her stories don't tell you, what we hear little about is the love so great, so overwhelming that without it life is not worthwhile. A love born of a beginning & seeks no end, a love simple & uncomplicated, the touch of a hand, a smile. Some years ago I read the story of an old headstone in a graveyard in the US, a friend had seen it, this massive mother like angel holding a child in her arms towering over all the other headstones, I wish I could find the picture to put up, the wings were awesome, casting a shadow across the grounds....my friend decided to visit the local library to research its history. The headstone marked the graves of a mother & child, the child had drowned accidentally at only a few years old & the mother some months later, sicken with grief, stopped eating, stoped living, her emptiness never filled & she died of 'melancholoy' her heart had stopped beating, it was broken. At the time my son was on treatment for cancer & I read this & felt a fear deep within that our time was coming & how would I live beyond these moments. How would I let go. My heart did break & it has never repaired, it broke again several times that year, my sister died in the same 12 mth & my marriage fell apart, it too never repaired.

When I was younger I thought having your heart broken was the most painful of all lifes experiences, I was right & yet I was wrong. Nothing has ever compared to the grief of losing a child. I learned I did not have to let go, that once you love, you can choose to keep it there, tucked inside forever, that I did not have to let go of the happiness, of the laughter & to answer all my previous questions, yes love makes you vulnerable & weak & strong & sometimes when your heart breaks, that place where you store your love, sometimes it doesn't mend. This is real love, not the romantic notions etched on movie screens & fiction....this is the earth shattering, keep you awake at night love & maybe there are many of you thinking well she just hasn't found the right one yet...maybe you are right, part of me is hoping you are right, the other is thinking there only so many times you can break the one thing & you need to have all the pieces to be able to put it back together...maybe I did have that once & maybe I lost that as well & maybe some pieces are just gone ? Maybe I've stopped believing ?

So I'm going to take a break from romantic chick flicks & fairytales & live in the moment & I hope you can prove me wrong...but I won't hold my breathe.

One final note....On the drive home the other day after being interstate for a few weeks, my daughter asked "how do you make wishes come true Mummy...." I had to think of a logical reason for a 4 yr old & found myself stating "you just have to ,wish them long enough & hard enough & believe in them too"........What it would be like to be 4 again ?