LOVERS…ONE OR MANY?
I see a discrepancy between the things we collect and the people we love.
Some people (like myself) collect books. Some amass a few dozen, others a few hundred, still others a few thousand. Sometimes they are collected specifically because they are very old. Sometimes because they are rare. Or perhaps the collector focuses exclusively on first editions. Or maybe the collection is of a particular genre, such as horror or murder mysteries. Or maybe the collection is small as it focuses on just one author’s work. Book collections are as varied as the collectors themselves.
But above all else, no matter what the defining characteristic of the collection, one overriding truth remains—it is impossible to read more than any one book at a time. So why have so many?
Look at car collectors. More expensive than book collecting (unless you deal with extremely ancient and/or rare books), but the collections still echo each other by their related traits. The cars may be of a specific type (four wheel drive, three wheeled cars, steam powered), from a specific manufacturer, perhaps even from a company that no longer exists (such as the rare Tucker cars), or classic road cars (like the Mustang), or muscle cars, etc. The list goes on and again is as varied as the person who collects them. But once again, above all else, no matter what is the common element of the collection, one overriding truth remains—it is impossible to drive more than any one car at a time. So why have so many?
I think the answer is obvious to most people. It is rare that a collection of just one thing is truly satisfying. It seems impossible that just one particular thing will ever truly fulfill the collector. Variety, it seems, truly is the spice of life, and this applies to collecting as well. Few would ever argue with such an accepted truth.
…So why is it that that most people react so violently when confronted with the idea of having even a small collection of lovers, or wives, or husbands (as the case applies to each individual)?
Most people agree that a ‘collection’ consisting of just one book is weird in the extreme. And in the case of bible-thumpers, blinding obsession and a soul-strangling restriction are the usual result of such a ‘collection’. Can you truly name one, just one book that would satisfy you if you were stranded on a deserted island? I cannot. I can think of nothing more boring and depressing on every level of my being than such a senseless restriction.
And when we use just one car until it is literally falling apart at the seams, people usually tease and prod us “to put the old clunker out of its misery” and buy another one.
So why do we humans completely fail to apply the same logic to relationships? Why restrict love?
Sometimes in an eon or two, a planet may radically change orbit and leave its current solar system to wander the galaxy until it finds a new star to orbit. It happens constantly all around the universe.
On a smaller scale, electrons sometimes leave their orbit around the nucleus of one atom, fly off and bond to another atom. It happens constantly all around us, only the actions are too small for our 5 senses to detect.
In relationships, single people behave similarly—breaking a bond with one person to find another person to latch on to. We find nothing strange about this behavior of single people as it happens constantly all around us.
So then why is it that so many feel uneasy when it comes to multiple simultaneous relationships, which are also called ‘plural relationships’ or ‘polyamory’?
Our solar system has nine known planets (depending on what astronomer you talk to). Think about it—many planets orbiting around one star. And yet we do not find this strange or repulsive. In all my life of following scientific advancements, I have never heard of an astronomer who got upset upon learning that earth is not the only planet orbiting our sun. No one has started any political groups to protest such, and I suspect (hope) that no one ever will.
Out of the 100+ known elements, only Hydrogen has just one electron orbiting its nucleus. Every other element on the periodic chart possesses more than one electron orbiting its nucleus. Some have literally dozens of electrons. And yet we do not find this strange or repulsive. And again, no protests here either.
So why do so many people (at least in this country) find it strange and repulsive to discover that some people in the world have many lovers, or many wives, or many husbands?
The answers to our questions are easily found in the naked expression of Mother Nature Herself…if we only take the time out of our fast-paced-and-quickly-going-nowhere-lives to just look.
If you are comfortable with just one of anything, be it a book, a car, a god or goddess, or a lover or spouse, then so be it—such expressions also exist in nature. But this natural behavior is absolutely not any more natural or normal than any other manifestation Nature deems fit to express.
All is equivalent. All have the God-given right to live as they choose. One person’s allegedly sensible and normal conduct is another’s raging psychosis.
There is no such thing as ‘normal’. All is equivalent in the Eyes of Eternity. Do as you will.
