When I think back over my life, I can identify with B.B. King’s old girlfriend in the song Better Not Look Down who had lived “in love and for love,/and over love, and under love all her life/If the arrows from cupid’s bow that had/passed through her heart had been sticking/Out of her body she would have looked like a porcupine.” I am convinced that in cupid’s quiver are numerous arrows designed for many levels of intimacy—and I’m not at all convinced that sexual intimacy is necessarily the sharpest or most important arrow. By falling in love I mean that there is a deep mutual harmony and trust which results in an attraction well beyond the customary. For such meetings, one has to say, at the minimum, that one has achieved an atypically good rapport. When I look back over my life, I cherish those times of joy when mutual affirmation gave me a deep sense of life and a certain level of affection was achieved. One of my early memories as a grade school student was an elderly lady I visited in the neighborhood after school. Her name was Mrs. Woods. She was a shut-in. In winter, we would sit before her fireplace and she would tell me stories of her youth. There have been many close relationships over the years sometimes with, sometimes without age differences. I am grateful for these gifts of affection and bonding. I’m personally convinced that my experience is widely shared. Looking back, those of us who share this experience share in common that porcupine feeling.
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