Contingency Love


"You know I got to find me
People, I got to find me
A part-time love
Oh I need
I need me a part-time love
Every time
Every time my baby leaves me
You know I need a part-time love."

Back in the day when innocence lived in young hearts, the concept of tangible love---in songs, movies, novels, even comic books---flourished.  Archie loved Veronica with pure and untainted devotion.  Back in the day, boundaries limited thoughts as well as behaviors. I remember, "Wake up, little Susie; wake up! We gotta go home.  Bemoaning the plight of love-struck teenagers caught in an untenable dilemma, haunted my days and nights. 

Susie and her boyfriend's fear merged with a kind of innocence that herald bygone days.   It chronicled a time of white snowdrifts, Valentine hearts, cotton candy, and boxes of chocolate-covered cherries.   1 Corinthians 13:1-4, 5, 7 describe both spiritual and natural love.  "Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast, it does not insist or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.  It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritated or resentful...Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things."

Culturally, it seems, love changes with time, circumstances, and generations.  Our parents and grandparents endorsed love that culminated in wedding vows.  It encompassed the mind, spirit, and body.  Their offspring seem to have relaxed either expectations or standards.  This brand of love appears fluid, based on "if," "maybe," "however," or bartering based on quid pro quo. 

It's become worse, I believe, with current generations.  Has the tender of the realm changed from the old-fashioned love of parents and grandparents to one of expediency or immediacy?  Two generations ago, many secondary school graduates matriculated to a college  or university as much in quest of an "M.R. S." as a "B.S." I'm just saying.  Marriage as a sacred contract identified most generations before and after World War II. 

Seismic shifts, indeed.  Did burning bras, the lost allure of a marriage certificate for the sake of one, and the fantastical happily-ever-afters follow the yellow-brick road to the Twelfth of Never? Probably a little bit of that and more.  My granddaughter and her siblings seem not to embrace the inherent promise of perfect unions.  Or imperfect ones.  Rather, they opt for living together, what my parent's generation called "shacking."  While I believe all babies are gifts from God, sadly, many young adults seem more intent on procreating than first building a nest and furnishing it.  Horse before the cart? Hmm. 

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