A Fine Romance

I have nothing new to say; ever, but especially about romance. What can be said generally? Has been said. What can be said specifically is between me, my loved ones, and the ad software on my cell phone.

So this is repetition: We're not in a romantic cultural moment.

I'll leave the "why" of that to you. There are plenty of obvious "whys" to me and they're all depressing. What I'm going to do here is celebrate some random art that helped me capture romance for myself recently, in all the ways that it can be healing. Maybe sharing can shift the moment at little.

I think these letters are going to be a lot of listicles about things I enjoy.

The part in When Harry Met Sally when Sally says "12 years and 3 months"

Listen, When Harry Met Sally is my favorite movie. I watch it when I'm sad, happy, or just alone for the weekend. My parents' had one of their first dates to go see this movie. This has to be item one.

Harry and Sally, after a tumultuous and vital friendship of 12 years, decide to start dating. The end of WHMS involves, among other things, Harry explaining the minutiae of their wedding, which happened only three months after they started dating. "It only took three months!" he says. Sally's face changes. "Twelve years and three months," she says.

And I cry!

This movie has a pretty typical reputation issue via some marketing misdirection. The question "can men and women really be friends?" that is often associated with WHMS is asked and answered, and is in no way a material concern of the film.

WHMS is instead a story about being every person you've ever been all at once, reconciling that for yourself, and finding someone else who loves every person you've ever been, all at once.

Ariana Grande covering "Goodnight and Go" by Imogen Heap

Imogen Heap is a compositional genius and Ariana Grande can only elevate any musical composition originally produced in England.

The result? What being in love sounds like, to me.

The bridge sounds like finding yourself warm in the snow with the love of your life and a century of time ahead of you. If this sounds corny to you, sucks to suck.

Anytime Anyone Waits Forever

People waiting some incalculable time in a suspended state in hopes of seeing their loved one again is an old romantic trope, and hell yes I love it. I haven't always been in love; I am now, but until you feel it, it is hard to find a frame of reference for that feeling.

With the benefit of hindsight, I think the "waiting forever" stories are a reliable frame of reference for being in love, and an expansive one. When plastic Rory waited for Amy in the last good season of Doctor Who, when Penelope and Odysseus waited for each other in the Children's Homer I was forced to read. It keyed me into the feeling of a patient love.

You can wait for someone you love to reach you again, and they can wait for you. This may apply to lovers, friends, and family, which is what makes the trope expansive. I am a big fan every time this trope comes up. I cried real bad when Zelda turned into that weird ass dragon in Tears of the Kingdom.

Anyway, for those who don't feel like an exercise in patience, there is always:

"Cut to the Feeling" by Carly Rae Jepsen

This is the greatest non-album love song of all-time, entirely by way of vibes and exuberance. I have never been hyperbolic, so you have no choice but to trust me. If you are in a good mood, find a loud speaker and turn it all the way on.

"Love Me JeJe" by Tems

I've been coming back to this song (and album) for months. It feels like a warm blanket and a cool breeze and a good day.

Excellent, straightforward songs asking for affection and expressing the same feel rare on this side of the internet. I appreciate them when I find them.

The first scene of Past Lives, if you've already seen Past Lives

If you haven't seen Past Lives, first ask yourself: Why don't I listen to Maggie, who correctly asserted that this should've won Best Picture 2024.

Second: Go watch it??

For the more cultured among us: What a movie, huh?? We live in a real romance desert, as noted above, so this is a real oasis. One where you can go to cry and cry until you may well have never left the desert, you're so dehydrated! It was really just Past Lives and What Happens Later pulling us romance-movie-heads through in 2023. (What Happens Later is a gorgeous Nora Ephron tribute about a briefly rekindled romance starring Meg Ryan and David Duchovny, critics be damned to hell.)

The movie opens on three people. There's a voiceover of an onlooker. She asks something like "who are they to each other? Obviously something." The history between the three people is palpable, though the man on the left and the woman in the center are certainly more engaged in conversation than the man on the right.

I'm not going to tell you anything else about the movie because literally just go watch it. BUT, the scene I've just described, once you've seen the whole movie and started it over, is breathtaking. Just a gorgeous illustration of a moment in time where people who are fated for one another connect, if only for that same moment of time. The way it looks like a scene out of any bar has added a lot of joy to my daily life, because I can see it any place I look for it.

A gay man named Niles and his gorgeous wife

Both Frasier and the The Nanny, acclaimed 90s sitcoms, feature a gay man named Niles falling convincingly in love with the most gorgeous woman you've ever seen.

"But Maggie, the Niles aren't gay!" When you say gay, do you realize what you say? Knock it off.

Niles and Daphne are my favorite fictional gay married couple. The way they overcame all the hardship (Maris) and prejudice (Daphne's mom) to finally be together and thrive over the course of an eleven year story is beautiful to me. Don't correct me.

Shoutout to Niles and C.C., too. I am too young to account for the 1990s, I can only enjoy its idiosyncratic glories.

When that lady throws those sticks in Mamma Mia! (2008)

When I first saw Mamma Mia! (2008), I thought it was stupid. I, many other 13 year olds, and almost every man was like "this movie is dumb."

Half my life on, I know more, and this movie rules. But returning to my original reaction: The part that I thought was stupid happened in the middle of "Dancing Queen", when one of the Greek Chorus hears Donna singing away her woes, tosses away her yard work, and joins the nascent disco parade with an audibly enhanced "oh yeah-ah-ah."

Mamma Mia! makes the bold choice of having an actual Greek Chorus. Even bolder, the Greek Chorus is cut into scenes without warning or context. If you approach this movie with irony or skepticism, it is hard to parse.

But, my goodness, irony ruins everything. Watching that movie for real, taking it for what it is instead of for the sense of moral and intellectual authority that hating it makes you imagine, is such a joy. Just let yourself feel what the characters feel, if you can.

The first time I watched it for real I was on a plane, and as a known plane crier this put me in the right spot to get swept away. Getting swept away is one of the Great Romantic Feelings. I couldn't be bothered to look for flaws, so when Dancing Queen started, I was the Dancing Queen. When the Greek Chorus threw her sticks, I threw my pretzels. For romance-as- getting simply swept away, 14/10 she is perfect.

Speaking of perfect:

"Silk Chiffon" by MUNA

It was the summer of 2022, my favorite ship had just come into port, and I had a new pushmower. Tini Howard told me to listen to MUNA so I did.

Silk Chiffon is a perfect song. I love my pushmower and I love listening to songs about falling in love with a girl at a CVS while mowing the lawn with my pushmower.

Here's a picture of me wearing a shirt that says "MUNA made me gay" at the Hoover Dam:

Life is so fun, imagine wearing a mini skirt and roller blading down that thing.

“In Praise of Pain” by Heather McHugh, from Hinge & Sign: Poems, 1968-1993. Copyright © 1994 by Heather McHugh.

". . .

For beauty’s sake, assault and drive and burn
the devil from the simply perfect sun.
Demand a birthmark on the skin of love,
a tremble in the touch, in come a cry,
and let the silverware of nights be flecked,
the moon pocked to distribute more or less
indwelling alloys of its dim and shine
by nip and tuck, by chance’s dance of laws

. . ."

This whole poem is romantic to me, but I love this stanza demanding that beauty be imperfect. I think something like actively seeking imperfection to celebrate it can really drive love forward in a fruitful way.

A teacher told me once that this was a morbid take but then they got divorced, so idk.

Random bonus items

There are the obvious ones: Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Love in the Time of Cholera, Love and Basketball, Knotting Hill, Brokeback Mountain, In the Mood for Love, Before Sunrise, Jane Eyre, Patrick singing “The Best” on Schitt’s Creek, Sarah Vaughan's "After Hours"

Then there are more: The book of essays from the vinyl copy of "Javelin" by Sufjan Stevens, Dayspring by Anthony Olivera, Dear Love by Rita Dove, Down with Love, Jane the Virgin (sorry about the cast), On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, "Heads Carolina Tales California" by Jo Dee Messina, My Old Ass, Arrival. . .

"All or nothing at all, the true lover says. He claims eternity. And rightly. How can it die when it's life itself?"

This list is not meant to be exhaustive or even kind of focused.

Have a good rest of your day!