Friday, 8/29/03 - 22:38
And now, here's the first of several interesting interview questions asked me by Luscious, Queen of Wands:
Do you have a favorite love song or poem? Share? What's so great about it?
The last time I thought about this question was during the process of wedding planning, when I needed program quotations and music for dances. The answer is no, though in the end I was pleased with the music and quotations I settled on. However, the reasons I lack a favorite love song go beyond my general disinclination to endorse just one of anything as my favorite. It's in fact well nigh logically impossible for me to have a favorite love song or poem.
I like plenty of love songs, but the love songs I like by and large are not good poetry. I like them because they remind me of good things, but I have a hard time endorsing them with whole hearted adoration when much of what I like is clearly extrinsic to the songs themselves. Case in point: "Never, My Love," by the Association -- "You're asking if there'll come a time when I grow tired of you. Never my love." Repeat last sentence ad infinitum. The Association was my favorite band in third grade, and then eleven years later when Ted was going home to California and I was getting ready to leave for Germany, I suddenly couldn't get this song out of my head. Almost four years after that, we played it as the final song at our wedding reception, and while Ted and I danced, most everyone else serendipitously joined hands and started dancing in a circle around us. It has to have been the most wonderful moment of the day, all the better for being a complete surprise. I learned later that Aunt Joyce had started the circle because it was customary at Nigerian weddings -- she spent most of her adult life as a doctor there -- but since no one else knew that, the ritual grew great layers of other meanings and I remember Rex Mundi, Gnostic PI (best livejournal name ever!), saying afterwards, "Occult enough for you?" Undoubtedly it also helped that most of our guests were uncoupled, having spectacularly failed to hook up with the cute photographer, and hence had little else to do during the slow dances. Anyway, I don't think it's asking too much that my favorite love song or poem have literary quality, at least to the extent that I'm not embarrassed to claim it as my favorite song.
The last time I had a favorite love poem was when I was in high school, and it was the following number (i.e. 5) by Catullus, which both has literary merit and perfectly reflected -- or else shaped -- how I saw love in highschool:
Vivamus mea Lesbia atque amemus
rumoresque senum severiorum
omnes unius aestimemas assis.
Soles occidere et redire possunt;
Nobis cum semel occidit brevis lux,
nox est perpetua una dormienda.
Da mi basia mille, deinde centum,
dein mille altera, dein secunda centum.
Dein, cum multa milia fecerimus,
conturbamimus illa, ne sciamus,
aut ne quis malus invidere possit,
cum tantum sciat esse basiorum.
But it's been seven years now since I've taken any Latin and I'm not sure I'd even be able to read that poem if I didn't already know what it said. I was never cool at translating poetry, but here are a few lines of song written in high school and closely inspired by the piece above:
Come sit in the garden and call me beloved
Stand close with me, for today we must die
If there's one point that eleventh grade Latin AP drove in, it's that living for an inherently uncertain future is a bad idea. And so I experienced life in general and love in particular as a rush of something vivid, precious, and endangered. The theory here was and probably still is that being in love is one of the best ways to sink hooks into the escaping moment, slow down time, and live fully.
Nevertheless, the idea of living everyday to the fullest has gradually turned out to be separate from the idea of living an entire life to the fullest, and the future has slowly crept into my relationship with Ted. There's little incentive for trying to make a relationship permanent if you think of love primarily in terms of today. Now as a married woman, I feel honored that I get to see who Ted will become as he ages and that in all likelihood I'll get to be the one to know him more fully than anyone else. I'm still convinced that no one but me knows how wise he is, and here I bet y'all didn't even realize that there was a competition to know Ted's wisdom. Anyway, I don't think it's demanding too much that any love poem or song I call my favorite should say something relevant about how my relationship with my husband has developed.
And now the part you've been waiting for -- I almost have sufficient material to prove that I couldn't possibly have a favorite love song right now. First, let's review our definition: x is shlafmanko's favorite love poem / song iff: 1. it has sufficient nostalgia value, 2. it has sufficient literary value, and 3. it has sufficient expressive value. Lemma 1: If a song has sufficient nostalgia value, then it must have satisfied criterion #3 at some time t years in the past, where t > 2. This is saying that a song doesn't have nostalgia value unless it means something in a particular context, and the way I listen to music, the meaning of the song is always at least partially related to the lyrics -- proof left to reader. Lemma 2: for any s > 2 years, schlafmanko's current views on love are different than they were s years ago (for s > 25, the change is trivial, since schlafmanko did not have views on anything before 25 years ago). Proof that schlafmanko has no favorite love song: Suppose y is schlafmanko's favorite love song or poem. Then by definition y has nostalgia value, so by lemma #1, y had sufficient expressive value at some time t in the past. If t < s, then y has little nostalgia value, therefore it is not schlafmanko's favorite song -- contradiction. If t > s, then according to lemma #2, the understanding of love expressed in song y is different than schlafmanko's current understanding of love. Therefore y does not satisfy criterion #3, therefore it is not schlafmanko's favorite song. Contradiction. Thus there is no y -- schlafmanko doesn't have a favorite love song. (okay, so I know this proof isn't really air tight)
On the other hand, if you're just asking which love song or poem I'm most fond of right now, it's Dave Matthews, "Where are you going?"
Long live Diaryland!
The five most recent entries:
More Naval Gazing - Saturday, 8/13/05
Anniversary Diving - Friday, 8/12/05
Academic Tip of the Week - Tuesday, May. 17, 2005
How to tell a Midwesterner - Sunday, 4/24/05
Academic Feelings - Thursday, 4/21/05
Ted's most recent entry:
Monday, May 12