Saturday

Dearest Darcy...
Women in your world of Pride and Predjudice were allowed scant contact with the opposite sex: but only within the bounds of the prudish standards and overly cautious restrictions commanded by society. The lady Elizabeth would never consider being alone with a man without an escort. Elizabeth would be extremely imprudent to kiss you in public, or at all, before marriage. And Elizabeth could never touch you in any capacity without implications on herself and your own reputation. Yet, despite all of the restrictions and the red-ribbon standing in your way, you managed to find each other amid a sweeping love story to eventually earn the love and respect of each other; and learn that your other half could touch, and be touched.

But Mr. Darcy, your story of love seems to be the exception. Which makes the fact that you and Lizzie only exist in fiction an even more sobering truth: real love is not contained in the pen of Jane Austen. Love is not printed from the computer of Nicolas Sparks. Love does not consist of perfect grammar and happenstance meetings that take your breath away. How could Lizzie and Mr. Darcy exist in a world of 90210 Gossip Girls that never look before they leap into another's pants? Were the restrictions placed on the Darcys' relationship the key to finding a lasting and meaningful relationship? Do restrictions make it more important to earn the love of another, as opposed to giving it away?

Dearest Darcy, is it foolish to think that you should only jump into the sack after you have a relationship in the bag?

Truth be told: I am a prude. Really. While this term comes fondly from an ex-boyfriend who lacked any understanding of why I would not want to be drunk at 11a.m. on a Tuesday; and considering his obvious void for wisdom on such matters of self-control, I try to restrict myself from ever putting too much stock into these words. But I am a prude. And proud to be. I have often wished that I could live in the world of Elizabeth Bennett, with all the societal restrictions placed upon dating. There were boundaries between men and women that needed to be overcome using inner-strength, self-control, and hard work.

Nowadays these boundaries have long past disappeared with nothing to stand in their place. Sex on the first date, teenage pregnancies, one-night-stands, random hook-ups at random parties, designated drunk make-out buddies, relationships as a sole source for validation, sex as a sole source for validation. And, unfortunately, this list could continue to take up pages and pages. How can you possibly work for a relationship, and earn the love and respect of another, when so little value is placed on the effort that longstanding love takes? What is more alarming is that women are placing less and less value on themselves and putting less and less effort into keeping their zippers up and their legs closed. The more and more modern way to earn love is to give away sex, and hope for love in return. Elizabeth Bennett didn't see this as an option, and neither do I.

Dearest Darcy, how can we expect to find actual relationships in this world, when it seems like society is suggesting that we only search for it between the sheets?

Tuesday

BOTTLECAP
If I sent you a message in a bottle,
would you run to the Thames and swim to me?
You've broken my heart, just as I intended,
but I never knew the salt-sweat taste of Kent
could change my mind.

We stared at screens, the sky, each other.
Searching for exactly what we intended to find.
Now is the time I need to you read my bottled-up feelings:
the messages I tried to send,
the green-glass bottle words I could never say.

What would we have been? sits upon my tongue.
Waiting for you to meet me, soaking and tired,
to meet my questions with the answer I intended.
Dripping from your lips.
We would have been...

If I sent you a message in a bottle,
would you allow me to run down to the Thames
and catch you both?
My flesh and sinews flexed over your frame,
writhing to reach you, just as I intended.

If I sent you a message in a bottle,
What would we have been?
On the tip of my tongue, on the edge of the Thames,
We would have been.
Laura Harpool

Dearest Darcy...
It seems insane to the common person to think of someone jumping out of a two-engine plane without a parachute. The first 9,999 feet would be exhilarating, without doubt. It's only that final harsh foot of sky that delivers a fatal blow to the adrenaline rush, the fall, and the beautiful life that fell the first 9,999 feet.

So, while only insane person would jump without a parachute, why are we expected to fall into love when we know our hearts will ache or break inevitably: all in the search to find the ONE that will be our parachute? The heartbreak comes in any number of forms: the first love lost, the breakup, giving up a lover to regain a friend, being dumped, or realizing that you were never really loved in the first place. Sure, sometimes only a little part of our heart is torn away, but even that little fractured heart feels like an insurmountable loss. If only our selfish hearts would stop beating with their fractures and breaks scarring our entire insides.

But heartache is just as dangerous. Missing the one that left, missing the one you left, needing an ex-lover to love you again, staying in a relationship that is changing in ways that hurt, needing the relationship to stay the same. However, having a heart ache does not mean that any love is lost or heart is broken...it just means that the love we maintain will cause us to ache. And sometimes, that ache doesn't go away. It eases over time, but a constant throbbing ache remains deep inside a heart that just can't let love go.

So, lets say that you're aboard this two-engine plane, in the open doorway about to jump. You realize that you don't have a parachute, but you decide to jump anyway. You convince yourself that the fall will be worth the eventual tortured end. Anyone watching you jump would deem you completely insane. But, when we fall in love, we are seen as doing what comes naturally to most of humanity.

Darcy, we fall just as fast, and just as hard into that first free-fall of love. And we too eventually will land on solid ground, but instead of a fatal foot at the end of a voluntary jump, we land in the midst of heartache and break. Non-fatal, but more painful than ceasing to feel upon landing. And we fall again and again and again.

Dearest Darcy, are we insane to fall 9,999 times just to find the parachute we've needed all along?

Sunday

I have been in love. Once.
I have never had a relationship that has lasted more than 6 months.
I have had my heart seriously broken, but not because the relationship truly was a serious one.
I don't have a boyfriend, and haven't for some time.

Yes.

But before you judge my inexperience for the affairs of the heart, let me explain.
This column in a hopeful attempt at deciphering the modern relationship through experiences both past and present. I am hoping to learn what I can of love, lust, and the like by asking the questions of my heart and mind each week. Only by asking the unasked can we learn and work through the immense hormones and emotions, towards truth. I am navigating the love labryinth to the best of my ability, and this column is my vague attempt at clasping the thread that leads me home.

So why does Darcy hold the thread?
Mr. Darcy has captivated women through Pride and Prejudice for centuries. He's a distant fellow that slowly learns to love, shows his vulnerability and his pride simultaneously, and eventually reveals himself to be a charmingly awkward man completely in love with a woman for everything that she is and isn't.

However an obvious question remains to be asked: didn't Jane Austen die alone? Yes, and Mr. Darcy is a complete work of fiction. He does not and never will exist. And even if he did...do we really want a Darcy?

I believe that women want someone that allows them independence. That respects them and admires them for who they truly are--not their glossed Facebook page credentials. A man in the 1800s, who doesn't constantly try to unzip their pants. A man who tells the truth, however awkward. A man who is a man; not someone who hopelessly falls into a helpless heap of flowers, candy, and shamefully bad poetry. Women want the idea of a modern Mr. Darcy. And I believe that we should hold to that idea. The idea that Mr. Darcy is right around the corner in time, to be met tomorrow.

Mr. Darcy holds the thread, because he is the raw idea of the man that all women desperately cling to when our hearts are broken and exposed. But also the man that we reach towards in times of hope.

Dearest Darcy...where do we go from here?