Is it just me, or...

...does it seem amazing that love - being in love - can still grip you so strongly, and affect you so physically, just as much at 43 as at 16?

It seems pretty amazing to me.

I've been gripped by one of those hopeless unrequited passions for...oh, ages, and it's been affecting my moods in a profound way for months and months. I've only really started to see that really clearly in the last month or so (before that, I'd been distracting myself via various substances and displacement activities).

Now that I see this powerful, hopeless passion for what it is, I find myself wobbling between three interconnected places: (i) incredulity that I'm still emotionally open enough to feel as strongly and all-consumingly as this; (ii) annoyance at myself for not being able to break out of the ridiculous loop of hope/dashed hope; (iii) a strange kind of wistful melancholy - I find myself smiling at myself and shaking my head as I drive around..."how funny that I can feel like this, still...".

In some ways, it's great feeling like I'm 17 again. And perplexing, too. But mostly bitter-sweet and exasperating. It's enough to make one turn back to drink.

Ho hum.