Age changes everything. As you gain weight and buy new shoes, your favorite motto in your slam book changes. When you were in first grade, you define love as a rosary that is full of mystery. But when you turned into an adult, you scratched your rosary definition and quoted 1st Corinthians 13. The search for true love becomes difficult because you learn more life principles, hear more love stories, meet other people, and experience love itself. Try to compare your budding romance years ago and to what you have now. See the difference.
Family Love
When you were a toddler, true love can only be seen in your parents. The person who supplies you milk is the person who loves you. Later on, older kids tease you to boys. You discovered love is being fond of the opposite sex.
My four year-old niece was asked by my sister, “Who do you want to marry?” She replied, “Kuya JB.”
“But he’s your cousin.”
She then said, “Classmate ko na lang.”
Because you do not know about incest, you want to marry your cousin, your brother or someone who acts like a father or a brother to you.
Grade school Love
You think you know about love.
I remember my ten-year old nephew said, “I have a girlfriend. Her name is Jordan Sparks but we broke up.”
“Why did you break-up?”
“Because we did not feel good about each other but we’re friends.”
Today, my nephew is 16 years old. I ask, “Do you remember Jordan Sparks?”
He just laughed and said it was nothing. Back then, it was fun to pretend to be like an adult.
Puberty Love
This time, your hormones are raging. You giggle a lot and blush when your crush in school says “Hi” to you. Your greatest dilemma is how to make him have a crush on you too. You sleep late at night thinking about him and for you, this is love.
Prom Love
You wish someone will escort you during prom night. Your ideal man is tall, dark, handsome or tall, mestizo, and cute. At the same time, boys prefer trophy girlfriends. It is either you watch lovebirds find their own space or you are one of the lovebirds who flirt in the school corridors and make other teens envy. If you have been steady for some time, you pray that the person will be your first and last. You plan to go to the same school in college. You are crazy over him. This is your idea of true love.
College Love
You want someone who’s hippie or a rebel. If in high school you’ve been hiding your romance, in college, you say, “Why hide when you can do it in public?” It is easy to hold hands at the park, embrace at 12 noon on campus. You might have thought of eloping and all those wild ideas of romance. You are brave to fight for love and it might have been true love.
Graduate Love
You think about the guys you turned down or the guys who did not notice you when you were in high school and college. Then you say to yourself: “Thank God. I haven’t dated those guys.” The guy who was once young and handsome is now fat and looks ten years older than you are. On the other hand, you are relieved at the thought that you could have been impregnated if you had dated those guys. You are happy because you are saved by those unwanted events in your life. While you find romance exciting, you believe true love will come in its own time because you have to earn money to prepare for your future family.
Thirties Love
If you are single, you wonder where love is regardless if it’s true love or not. You used to like men featured on magazine but now all you want is just a responsible man who can pay the bills and be a great family man. You believe that love can be nurtured and that it should be worked out by two people. If your needs meet and if he does not interfere your career, go for it.
Adult Love
You are happily married. You are grateful that you have achieved it. You are an example to other couples. You know that you choose the right man. It is definitely true love. If you aren’t happily married or plainly ‘just married’, you say, “This is true love. I am able to stick with you for better and for worse.”
On the other hand, if you are not married, you might be seriously thinking of marriage and love. You are having second thoughts of tying a knot because of the expenses. You have to save money for your wedding and for your annulment (in case of emergency).
Senior Love
Hopefully, your spouse thinks you are the best wife in the whole world. He wants to live longer because he does not want to see you marry someone else. You talk like best friends. You give him medicine and nurse him all the time. You counsel other couples because you know that what you have is true love.