One of my favorite love songs is "Home" by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. The chorus of the song says, "Home, let me go home, home is wherever I'm with you." I find that sentiment really heart-warming because it is so simple. Love is about being at home. Another one of my favorite songs says, "You're already home where you feel loved." That concept of being at home, of being comfortable and stable is really appealing to me. Home is what I look for in a relationship. In Lord Huron's "Time to Run," the narrator talks about love and relationships becoming intrinsic parts of you. Love is indelible - no one can take it from you, "I wanted everyone to know you're the girl for me/ I wanted everybody else in the world to know it/That I ain't ever gonna' let 'em take the life from me." I like the idea that your love with a person is unique to just the two of you and it is something that belongs entirely to you both. I think that is really powerful because the same cannot be said for much else in this world.
"You Can Call Me Al" is probably not considered by most as one of Paul Simon's love songs, but it is one of my favorites. Although it has a very upbeat pop melody, its lyrics are saturated with the anxieties and loneliness every person feels at some point. The song basically depicts a man who feels completely desolate and seeks companionship as inspiration. Love is his role model. Maybe it is not necessarily love in a romantic way either, but a love in friendship. He says, "If you be my bodyguard, I can be your long lost pal/And Betty when you call me, you can call me Al." I think we so often focus on the idea of soul-mates as romantic partners, but I do not believe that. First of all, I think there are many people in this large world with whom you are potentially compatible, and I believe there are different points in life at which different relationships (platonic or romantic) satisfy our needs somehow. My best friend, I think, could be one of my soul-mates. We have been best friends for 10 years, and for 7 of those years we have not lived near each other or gone to school together, but she is the person I am currently closest with in my life. I can share anything with her and her likewise. Our relationship is like that of Betty and Al's. We just work together; we support each other.
Finally, I think that while emotional intimacy is important to romantic relationships, we overlook the little things like being able to laugh together. Sinead O'Connor sings in her song "The Wolf is Getting Married" that, "you're smile makes me smile/you're joy gives me joy/you're hope gives me hope." I think humor and laughter in a relationship is so important. I think it is sweeter when my grandparents laugh together than when they show any other sign of affection. Someday, I hope to have a long term committed relationship, perhaps decades long as my grandparents' and still be able to laugh with my partner.
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