love is a miracle. seriously, people.

Disclaimer: The following does not relate to any one circumstance in my own life or that of anyone else but rather to the cohesive whole of all of my experiences and observations. Point being, don't read into this or try to figure out who I'm talking about, because I'm telling you now: I'm talking about the whole world. And everyone in it.

Tonight, my friends, I present one of my more brilliant (?) observations of late, something very simple but also true and worth at least a moment or two of pondering. Here it is:

For two people to (1) fall in love (2) with each other (3) at the same time (4) to even somewhere near the same degree... this is pretty near to a miracle.

This is like magic.

Really, though, how likely is that to actually happen??? All of these things, all at the same time? Not likely. Not likely at all. And I'm a realist in my (still persistent) romantic sensibilities; I am not talking about perfection, and I know well that any relationship necessitates significant work. But still. We should be shocked that it EVER happens.

Now on the one hand, this observation makes genuine love coursing back and forth between two people stop me in my tracks with its beauty. But the whole thing also just makes my heart ache. I know what it feels like to be in those other, more typical situations, in the more likely event that only one person has fallen, the timing is off or the levels of attachment are entirely unequal. I have been the person offering unrequited affection and the person not requiting the affection of another, and, as most of us know well, neither one is pleasant. And this is happening all the time, all around me, and people ache and hurt just for this crazy, inexplicable thing that is love.

I'm not trying to be cynical; I just want to keep things in perspective. For me personally, at this moment in my life, I cannot even imagine tumbling into a relationship in which the aforementioned points (even mostly) line up, and I don't want to forget feeling this way. If ever this kind of loving happens in my life, I do not want to take it for granted.

So we cannot expect this sensical, non-chaotic relationality as we so readily tend to... but let’s please be thankful and in awe when it happens. Hear that, all you folks in (even relatively) happy, committed relationships? Remember what a crazy, beautiful, unlikely thing it is that you are where you are, with that person you are with. How ever did this happen when all the cards seem stacked against? I know it's not perfect; of course it isn't perfect. Nothing is without its degree of brokenness. But even so... what magic!

Love. Really. Oh, what a world we live in.