Love vs freedom

I'm reading this book by Nicole Krauss "Man walks into a room" and again I'm more and more convinced that her books are the best life-love stories ever. There is not much drama in them. Well, it's still there, but written in a very subtle way. But what is most important, those stories are full of intelligence. Great food for thought. 

And I read one of the best dialogs about life and relations ever: it's about being in love and loved and striving to be free at the same time. Those who've been in a real relationship, whose heart was broken or who broke someone's heart, will definitely understand and agree. So here are some excerpts: 

Samson: If being in love only made people more lonely, why would everyone want it so much?

Ray: Because of the illusion. You fall in love, it's intoxicating, and for a little while you feel like you've actually become one with the other person. Merged souls, and so on. You think you'll never be lonely again. Only it doesn't last and soon you realize you can only get so close, and you end up brutally disappointed, more alone than ever, because the illusion - the hope you'd held on to all those years - has been shattered. 

But see, the incredible thing about people is that we forget. Time passes and somehow the hope creeps back and sooner or later someone else comes along and we think this is the one. And the whole things starts all over again. We go through our lives like that, and either we just accept the lesser relationship - it may not be total understanding, but it's pretty good - or we keep trying for that perfect union, trying and failing, leaving behind us a trail of broken hearts, our own included. In the end, we die as alone as we were born, having struggled to understand others, to make ourselves understood, but having failed in what we once imagined was possible. 

Samson: People really want that, what did you say, merging souls? Total union?

Ray: Yes. Or at least they think they do. Mostly what they want, I think, is to feel known. 

Samson: But don't you think that being alone is somehow... I don't know, good? That to love someone is one thing, but if it means giving up the part of you that's alone and free...

Ray: That's just it! How to be alone, to remain free, but not feel longing, not to feel imprisoned in oneself. That is what interests me.