When lovers part ways to go to foreign climes, there is always a mixed bag of emotions, fears, doubts, anticipation and sorrow. The person who is leaving is looking forward to new adventures, even though the pain of leaving a loved one behind is pervasive.
As for that lover who’s left behind, the emotions and anguish are magnified, surpassed only by doubts, for he or she doesn’t know if the partner will lose feelings or find somebody else and never return.
“Cause I’m leaving, on a jet plane, don’t know when I’ll be back again.” That song Leaving on a jet plane, has haunted countless couples who’ve experienced the pain of losing someone to a long distance relationship. It gives a different meaning to the term dearly departed.
“Why you crying dear?” “My boyfriend is dearly departed, he just left for foreign.” Can the relationship work, or are they doomed to fritter away, dispersed like dandelion dust, melt away like an icecube in the sun?
Distance and time do take their toll on even the strongest love, and after a while, they prove to be too much for mere mortals to endure.
There’s an old Jamaican saying, ‘Love and sea water don’t mix.’ That chasm, that abyss, that great divide, that void, that enormous distance, filled only with the lapping waves of an infinite ocean will override any feelings of love that now exist.
Well, at times it does last for a while, and the lovers get a shot at true love, but only if there’s a definite end in sight, a finite time. If one party goes away to school for a prescribed time, there might be a chance.
But if the time is uncertain, open ended, infinite, like a big job overseas which may last for many years, the toll that it takes on the lovers may be insurmountable.
The danger lies in one lover starting a new life while being away, forging new friendships, meeting new people, being exposed to things that weren’t available here. Or conversely, the one left behind got so lonely that he or she sought the company of someone else.
‘And if you can’t be with the one you love, honey,Love the one you’re with.’
The parting scenes can be poignant, painful, pitiful, promising. “Honey, don’t worry, I’ll wait for you no matter how long it takes.”
There’s the internet, but after a year and a half of emotional e-love, the relationship is experiencing a crisis, there are cracks in the carapace, fractures, fissures in the flooring, chasms in the characters.
The distance is taking its toll. “Yes we talk every day and night, but phone romance can only do so much.”. It’s hard for a young man still in his prime to endure that sort of long distance celibate love.
How long can he endure, how long can she stay alone in this long distance love? Is it fair, don’t they both fear that they won’t fare well during these long cold lonely nights apart from each other? Sure, all the poets write that absence makes the heart grow fonder, but the question is, fonder for who?
Do an experiment, leave your best friend to ‘look after’ your lover while you’re away and see what happens after three or four years. “Honey, I held out as long as I could, but one rainy night my body just gave in.”
‘When two hearts are meant for each other, no distance is too far, no time is too long, and no other love can break them apart.’
That sounds so romantic, platitudinous, pedantic, philosophical, pleasing, promising, but is it practical? Does it have a place in this fast paced whirling world of modern but often ephemeral romance? Can the lovers sustain the test of time, and more importantly, can they survive love and sea water?
