There is nothing more unattractive than self-doubt and the lack of attention to detail. I know this. Most people get it, although the occasional some don’t. One of my favorite movies is “Closer” starring Natalie Portman, Jude Law, Clive Davis, and Julia Roberts. The movie speaks specifically to human reaction and indulgence.
In one scene in the movie Alice (Natalie Portman) is on the couch sleepily awaking as Dan (Jude Law) comes home from wherever. The scene shows a rather unkept mess backdrop to her frazzled hair and sloppily worn ensemble. A few small words exchange and Dan ends up telling Alice that “this will hurt,” and when asked why he went outside of their relationship he explains “because she didn’t need me.” What a carnival of crashing.
It causes me to wonder... when someone needs you, doesn’t that make them less desirable in most senses when applied to short-entering-long-term relationships? Cause and effects of marriages in my opinion are in most cases affected by money, which is most closely related to the neediness of either individual. Dan cheated on Alice because the other woman Anna (Julia Roberts) wasn’t in need of him, but rather in want. The results of human behavior are as devastating to "real life" events just as they are in movies.
It is so important to ask about the way a person lived as a child. Childhood is important as it directly mirrors the person one becomes and can directly affect a person's wants vs. their needs. In some cases a child with alcoholic parents either later become alcoholics, or run Alcoholics Anonymous centers preventing others from becoming who their parents became. Most applies to other wayward lifestyles as well.
In my household growing up I saw my father as the above average workaholic owning his own business for years and years, hardly making time for himself or his family because of his sacrifice for them. I also developed a need for a simple father figure because of the countless nights I spent dozing off as I waited in pajamas for my kiss goodnight at the bottom where my staircase swiveled into brick from carpet... for my daddy to come home. Some mornings I woke across the bottom of the stairs instead of in my princess bed, which meant daddy was still at the office. Never mind the endless hours I took for granted that my mother slaved around the house picking up after my Smurf collection, Where’s Waldo books, or Easy Bake Oven. Never mind that she did more dishes for every dish I grabbed and threw nonchalantly in the sink as she was up to her elbows in bubbles already. Never mind that the only time I ever saw her was in front of our washing machine, folding the towels, or occasionally cursing at the television. And never mind the appointments she took me to, the gladioli she fiddled with in the garden, the berries on the trees she warned me not to eat-- and then stomach ache, or the boo-boo’s she kissed upper thigh after I fell sideways off my bike--raw skin scratched across the sidewalk... she made me get up and get right back on, my whole body aching. Everybody laughed at that bike because it had tassels on the handlebars but no one laughed when I got so good at riding that I could ride without hands and spread my legs mid-motion wheels peddling below. No, those lessons went thankless. And never once did I ever ask her about her wants or her needs.
My parents didn’t end up together. Mother married someone else. Father stayed working, and became more successful until the competition beat his business into the asphalt, then the sewer. The people who subconsciously get my attention naturally aren’t the middle-men... but the rather successful business men that won’t have time to give me the attention I need (much like my father) or the starving artists, as I can see myself in them.
Such outcomes cause jolts of fascination in me because as much as other instances contributed to my parents’ demise as a couple, I often wonder if the lot of it had to do with my mother not feeling as wanted, or as much needed as my father. Or rather if my father had felt more wanted what would have changed as a family between us all? What selfless sacrifices they made. How important it is to show that you want someone.
Now as an adult I ponder, is the want equal to the need as much? Are aesthetics as important as the foundation? Body vs. mind? Can too much need and not enough want steer a relationship off it’s course just as much as too much want and not enough there to provide fulfillment to needs? Without a happy balance can one appreciate it more when either side is lacking? I am listening to the song from Disney’s “Tangled” soundtrack by Grace Potter and the Nocturnals “I Want Something That I Want,” and perhaps the need keeps you there, but the want keeps you wanting to be there.
Once balance is reached between want and need boredom occurs and the relationship is subject to the natural occurrence of human reaction that isn’t preconceived or well thought out.
What are your ideas on the matter?
