What do we know about love? That like Pathaan, everyone has a definite opinion about what it means—and that all these opinions are radically different from each other. ‘Love is bed tea,' I texted a friend, who knows that the only clause in my imaginary prenup was that my husband should make morning tea and hand it to me in bed, with a kiss if possible. ‘Hmmm,' he texted back. ‘I never liked drinking/eating in bed.'
After half a century of loving and being loved, here's what I know about love.
Love has a lasting, limitless quality. Even the ghosts of those whom you have loved and left have a tendency to linger, and they will often make their presence felt at the most inopportune of times.
Heartbreak makes headlines through the year, but love gets a (fiercely commercial) spotlight only on this date. In reality, love is unbranded, is not red or pink, and has no shape (not even teddy bear). Its smell and taste are entirely individual. For me, it smells like red earth in pouring rain or the potent headiness of a raat ki rani tree on a moonlit street and tastes like childhood family lunches.
Love is seeing—and staying. It is access to inner worlds, unmasked selves, vulnerabilities, bodies and bodily fluids—and acceptance of everything you have been shown. Love is pain every time someone misuses or discards this access.
For a quality that's so much in demand, it's never ceased to amaze me how we seek love in all the wrong places. Love is solitude and love is shared humanity. Love is bonding on sameness and love is when opposites attract. Love is definitely inter-species. Love is girlfriends and daughters who are political. Love is a safe home to grow up in. Love is art, poetry, music, books, nature—especially trees that talk to you and rivers full of pain. Love is justice and equality. Love is revolution. Love is chaos and calmness. Love is a lone shooting star in a crowded night sky.
Some, like Polish Nobel laureate Wisława Szymborska, one of my favourite poets, distinguish great love from love. “… great love is never justified. It's like the little tree that springs up in some inexplicable fashion on the side of a cliff: where are its roots, what does it feed on, what miracle produces those green leaves? But it does exist and it really is green—clearly, then, it's getting whatever it needs to survive.”
Honestly, all love is miraculous and difficult to explain. And it's hard work, as I'm sure my husband will confirm after 23 years of giving me bed tea. But would love be as meaningful if it were easy?
Love is the ability to elevate everyday life and it has the power to turn things around. When we were juggling two households during Covid, the husband and I gamified the long list of monotonous tasks that suddenly became our responsibility and managed to cheerily grimace our way through them. Despite the tragedies unspooling everywhere, I'll also remember Covid as the time my 10-year-old gained the confidence to go shopping alone for groceries in the neighbourhood on her cycle. Love is full of surprises.
Love can't be policed or controlled. Even if you criminalise love and segregate it, lovers will find a way. At India Love Project, an Instagram project I co-founded in 2020, lovers have met by chance on a walk when his dog jumped on her. They have met as rival radio jockeys, over the dissection table or as sports opponents. In one case, a Muslim woman and a Hindu man met when he dialled a wrong number. Another time, in a world before smartphones, they met when a stranger texted a woman asking her why she hadn't been in touch and how she was doing. He thought he was texting his friend.
Love is being present, and love is showing up. I've said this before, but the women who showed up for me through my court trial will always be a source of inner light. Love is remembering, acknowledging, hat-tipping.
Love is survival, love is asking for help. Love is communicating and enjoying comfortable silences. Love is holding hands, like my parents have for more than 50 years on Mumbai's Marine Drive. Say hi if you spot them.
Love is in the details. And it's the big picture. Love is r.e.s.p.e.c.t, the Aretha Franklin version only.
Love is perseverance, resilience, incandescence and so many other words that end with ‘nce'. It's the same dull dance repeated every single day. But then, sometimes, the conditions come together just right and it's the easiest route to transcendence. Love is about togetherness that creates more such moments of transcendence.
Priya Ramani is a Bengaluru-based journalist and is on the editorial board of Article-14.com.
The views expressed here are those of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views of BQ Prime or its editorial team.
Essential Business Intelligence, Continuous LIVE TV, Sharp Market Insights, Practical Personal Finance Advice and Latest Stories — On NDTV Profit.