Love is Like a Child

Love is like a child, That longs for everything it can come by.

                                    --- William Shakespeare in The Two Gentlemen of Verona

So there I was, Googling along the internet, searching for an eloquent way to express my feelings and thought, “Who better to wax eloquent than Shakespeare?” and thus I found myself reading lists of Shakespeare quotes about love. Most of them I’d heard and none of them fit the moment, but then I saw this one. I read no further.

I can hardly expand on Shakespeare’s insightfulness, but I’m going to try because when I searched for interpretations of that quote I found little if anything at all.  Granted, I Googled the quote and its meaning and I looked through the first dozen or so returns - not necessarily what one would call extensive research, but it’s a blog post I’m writing, not a master’s thesis.

So this guy - this duke - so in love is he,  that he requires a ladder to climb to the chamber of the woman who is the object of his affection. He needs the ladder “this very night, because Love is like a child, That longs for everything it can come by.”

Shakespeare knew what he was talking about. One taste of love  - one longing gaze into each other’s eyes, one passionate kiss - and we’re envisioning an altar, a life of bliss, a forever happily ever after with never a cross word, never a financial crisis…  we want it all. If you’ve ever been with a nine year old boy in the Lego aisle at Toys ‘R Us, you'll understand this analogy: You bought him one $7.99 70-piece X-wing fighter and he is now screaming for the $149.00 Millenium Falcon. He is totally infatuated with the Legos. He will never look at a Pokemon card again.

But be wary, Legos...  Your days are numbered. Minecraft is lurking around the corner and though you be enticing and he wants all of you, you are pricey and if you demand too much, he'll go running.

In my experience, it’s that ‘wanting it all’ that usually scares guys right off the ladder (am I right, girls?), so I'm suspicious of a guy who is so eager to be with this girl that he’s going to take any means necessary to scale the tower to climb into her room. Sure he wants her now, but when he realizes how much the Death Star (marriage) will cost, he'll be gone.

I’m afraid of 'longing for everything.' I fear scaring someone I love away because he's the kid in the Lego aisle wanting it all and realizing the commitment it will take to have it.

But if it’s the right guy - maybe even if I scare him off a few times, he’ll still come back.

Because he does long for everything he can come by.

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