#15: a young lady's miseducation on the idea of love.

"love actually is all around"

Feb 18, 2024

On the day before Valentine's, you get a text from a boy. It read: "Hey...do you want to hang out tomorrow? Just the two of us?" Instead of being elated, annoyance flames your body and your brow thins with irritation. You show your friend the message on your phone and as she reads it, she chuckles ruefully, shaking her head. You ask her "What do I say? How do I tell him no?" She says “ I don't know, girl. Just do it?"

Eventually, after much deliberation, you send a message back to him "Hi!" You over-enthusiastically type. "Oh...I would have loved to, but I will be super busy on Wednesday." His reply is swift. "Oh okay." he says. You are relieved he didn’t make it weird. A part of you wishes you said yes. You know he's the only one going to ask you out. But you have a little bit of self-respect. You know deep down, that for him, there is no disappointment behind the words he just typed. For him it is simply one down, nine to go. You are just a girl in a long line of girls he will try to spend valentine’s with. You know he is probably texting someone now. You don't really mind because you don't even like him like that.

You realize there must be a study of irritation and discomfort on your face because your friend is giving you a look. Your friend keeps looking at you and shakes her head in amusement. You tell her “Before you think me cynical, hear me out.” You then tell her more about this fellow that just texted. It is not a compliment that this person texted. For the past three years, he has reached out to you only on Valentine's. His message always stays the same. Hey. Do you want to hang out tomorrow? Just the two of us? Watch a movie or something?

Your friend agrees that he is an idiot and is just looking to get laid. Still annoyed, you look at her quizzically, enraged, your voice raised a notch “ But do I look like someone to get laid with?!”

—

Just a few days before the infamous text, you were chatting with a new friend. You had taken pictures for your birthday, and you were trying your damnedest not to share it with your friends as you wanted to surprise them. In your excitement and quest for good opinion, you share your photoshoot pictures with this new friend. You have no idea he is going to destroy your fragile sense of self with his next words.

The first thing he types is “You cut your hair?!”. You can feel the conversation already going left. You type back. “ Um, yes. Why?”

He says. “ It is ugly. I wouldn’t lie to you. It is very ugly.”

You read and reread the message. You almost cannot believe it. Your heart drops and you can feel blood beating in your ears. You switch your phone off and have a good cry for almost twenty minutes. You had thought those pictures were stunning! You loved your haircut and your smile! You had thought your eyes were pretty!

After your self-pitying cry, you post a screenshot of the conversation on your WhatsApp stories. Your friends are as outraged as you are. You post funny memes to go along with the screenshot because you're Nigerian. You're an expert in suffering and smiling. You're butt hurt but at least you can make a joke out of it.

You block him and delete his number so that when the rage and embarrassment passes, you wouldn't unblock him.

You tell yourself “on valentine’s day someone is going to text me, and that will prove that i am not ugly.”

Even you know that that is a lie.

—

Of course no one texts you on Valentine’s Day.

You sleep throughout the day because you don't want to be alert, awake and functioning. You don't want to think. You know yourself too much. You know that thinking will lead to over thinking, and that negative thoughts can permeate your mind and ruin your day. Even you are puzzled by this behavior of yours. You thought you didn't care about boys. Was it all a lie? You wonder if your de-centering boys stance will stand if you were being picked by them. You cannot seem to make your mind up; boys or no boys? Are you a bad feminist? Ashamed, you admit to yourself that you have spent half of your conscious life worrying about how you come across to boys. This is why the new friend's comments hurt you so deeply. On the subject of boys, you have been unsuccessful in that regard. Your face flames up with embarrassment when you remember that you told your high school crush that you liked him and his response was: "God will help you get over it."

You find it amusing that you expect Valentine platitudes when you don't even talk to anyone. You don't even want to talk to anyone!

You have had conversations about this with your best friend. She is so wise. She reminds you that you are human, living a world full of other humans, under a system created by humans. You need that reminder because you like to think yourself invincible, above human feelings and human quirks. She reminds you that it is okay to feel a kind of way about what is termed "love" and "desirability”. You're a living, breathing being after all.

—

One thing you love to do is soul-search. You are your own therapist. You love to sit with yourself, to sit outside of yourself, and ask yourself questions. You believe it keeps you grounded. When you feel feelings, you love to investigate their roots. And so the feeling of inadequacy that came around valentine’s made you do some digging into the mines of your soul.

Your soul-searching bears fruit. You have some answers. You find that you are feeling like you've missed out on something special at nineteen just because you don't have a boyfriend, talking stage or even a crush. You find that you are not the only one who feels this way. That's just how the world is. There is an implicit over-importance of romantic love over every other expression of love.

What exactly is love? What does it mean to love? Why are we all obsessed with love? You don't have all the answers; you never may. But you know you have experienced love. Not romantic, but love nonetheless. You chide yourself for not ascertaining importance to the expressions of love you have received over the years.

You know that love is selfless. You know that love is sacrifice-in-action. You know that the biggest show of love ever was the love that Jesus showed on the cross. There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.¹

Your mum once told you what love meant to her. She said “From the day you were born, from the moment I looked into your wrinkled face, I stopped living for myself and started living for you.” You had asked your best friend what love meant to her. Love for her was appreciating the now and storing away memories for later. She said, “Things happen. I don't pray for them not to happen, but they happen. So, when we share a joke or go intellectual on a particular topic, I take extra care to file away those moments. When she (my sister) annoys me, even when my anger is at the boiling point and I'm screaming at her, I still at that very moment immersing myself in the moment.”

A wave of reassurance comes over you. You are loved. You are cherished by those who matter. You are made with love and you are made of love. You are loved by the One who created you. So loved, that He died for you. You really cannot get over the fact that He died for you. You cannot stop thinking about Him even when you try. You are loved unconditionally by your family. You have the gift of friendship – one of the most secure and affirming expressions of love there ever was. How reassuring is that, that there are people willing to love you, to understand you, no matter what. That is love. The opening monologue of Love Actually (2003) comes to mind.

“Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport. General opinion’s starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don’t see that. It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often it’s not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it’s always there – fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends. When the planes hit the Twin Towers, as far as I know, none of the phone calls from the people on board were messages of hate or revenge – they were all messages of love. If you look for it, I’ve got a sneaky feeling you’ll find that love actually is all around.”

On romance and boys and men, you remind yourself that you are young! You're just a teenager. You're just starting out in life. Yes, most of the rom-coms are set on college campuses, with leads your age. But it doesn't matter. You're still a baby. Your frontal lobe isn't even developed yet. God knows what He is doing keeping romantic interests away from you.

There is so much about love and the idea of love that you don't understand. But that is what life is about. Life is about love. And as you live life, you will find out more about love.

The sniffles stop and the tears dry up. You were loved from the moment you opened your eyes. You are loved now. You will be loved in the future. Somehow, that is enough.