What's in a name

­I realized the other day that I never really explained the title of this little blog, “All love is unrequited.” It’s a long story, but I might as well tell it anyway.

So first off, I’m a TV addict. As in, I’m the sort of person, who when they find a TV show that they like, will spend the next few days watching said TV show constantly through various nefarious means. This happened to me for Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Heroes, etc. Not exactly a good habit. But anyway, this last summer, I was actually out on the hunt for a good TV show, and I kept on finding recommendations online to watch something called Babylon 5. I had never heard of the show and a casual internet search showed that it had been a sci fi show back in the ‘90s which had gotten good critical response though never had a stellar following. So I began to watch it. I actually really didn’t love it at first, but in all my research (ha…I’m talking about researching TV shows) people had said that the first season wasn’t as good as the following seasons. So I trudged along. And I’m so grateful I did. I don’t think I’ve loved a TV show more than Babylon 5. It had intrigue, compelling characters that developed over time and eventually reached resolutions, long overarching plot lines, and so much more. Granted the acting wasn’t great (except for a few stellar actors) nor were the special effects (of course, I’m comparing them to current technology) but overall it was fantastic.

So, coming back to the title of my blog, near the end of the show, there was this heart breaking story arc. Essentially, this man who had always been in love with one of the main characters, who never returned said feelings mostly because she was sort of arrogant, sacrificed himself to save her. Yeah, it sounds cliché, but she was reflecting on it afterwards (more of actually sobbing) because she knew he had always loved her, and that a part of her loved him, but never to the same extent. She goes through all these emotions, part of it survivors guilt, part of it love, part of it who knows what. At the end the scene, she says the line, of which this blog derives its’ name, “all love is unrequited, all of it.”

This line resonated with me days and weeks after I watched it (to this day actually). I kept on thinking about it; what it meant, whether it was true, etc. I mean, to some extent, I definitely think it is true. The phrase essentially says that one’s love can never be returned by another, and  I mean, no matter how in love two people are, will they ever really be able to return the exact same love that the other feels for them? Human beings are complex people with complex emotions. Emotional attachments and love form for different reasons and in different ways for each person. So in that sense, we can never return some one’s love in the exact same way. That said, I still definitely believe two people who are in love can form a healthy and stable relationship.

I think this probably also resonated with me so much partially because of this whole situation I’m in. After all, right now I definitely feel the more negative parts of that phrase; that I’ll never be able to find someone who loves me in return, that I’ll be alone forever. Alas the life of a gay Mormon. Hopefully that part in particular isn’t true though. I guess my emotions are just playing with me again. And being at BYU probably doesn’t help my case either. C’est la vie…