Valentine's Extravaganza

True Love?

Arrgh! These prompts get worse and worse.

"True Love"?

Do I know what True Love is?

Did I love Victoria? Or any of the dozens of other people I've had crushes on, for that matter?

How about Dana? Funny thing is, I feel like I did, but not just because she was the only girl in the school who would peel up her bra for me.

How about Johanna? That's that Ecuadorian girl that I had my first (and actually last) serious relationship with. You know, vey early on I told her that I loved her. I had heard that you shouldn't do that too soon, but I reasoned that it wasn't a big mistake because--well look at it this way. I say that I love ice cream, Philip K. Dick books, and many other things. So telling her that I loved her shouldn't have been the big deal. I'm not saying that I consider love to be a cheap word--far from it. I'm saying that I don't really know what it means, and I don't think I can ever really know what it means, so maybe it's best to say it when you think it's right and not worry too much about the consequences of being wrong later.

Did that make no sense? Well, I assume your first language is English, so imagine trying to explain something like that to someone whose first language is Spanish and you'll understand where I was with Johanna. Several times she asked me if I really loved her. I always said, "yes" and I didn't consider it lying.

Then one day, she left.

No explanation. She just left. I didn't know what to do or what to think. Had she finally seen what all those girls in High School had seen? That I was some kind of loser? You know, I almost could have lived with that, but I sent her an e-mail. She responded with the statement. "I do love, you, Alex. The problem is that you don't love me?"

I was floored. How do you respond to an accusation like that?

I wanted to prove to her that I did love her? But it was like she wouldn't even let me try.