It’s generally believed that the very beginnings of a relationship are beautiful, romantic and tingly, and then everything settles into routine which is boring at best and dreary at worst.
In reality, it’s the other way round. The start of a relationship is uncomfortable and has to be borne with patience to get to the really good stuff. You have to do a lot of learning, self-editing, and self-explanation as you integrate the other person onto your life. Ten years in is when you get to the really amazing stuff. The wordless dialogue, the seamless taking over of each other’s burdens, the ease of handling the other’s intolerable affects. The discomforts of the beginning are only justified by the eventual arrival of the delayed bounties of permanent love.
This is why the endless scrolling through partners that we are offered as the most important expression of freedom is so depressing and miserable for everybody who tries it and is not a sociopath.
I’m inspired to write this by Tony Tulathimutte’s excellent novel Rejection which I mistakenly referred to as a short story collection yesterday. You only figure out it’s a novel on page 60, so I do have an excuse. I’m still reading the novel, which has been referred to as the first truly incel work of fiction, and will say more about it later.
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