Memoirs of a Simp: My Undying Love for Rachel Berry
PROLOGUE
Love.
The word has a complex etymology. As a noun, it's derived form Old English lufu meaning 'romantic sexual attraction; affection; friendliness'; from German Liebe 'love'. Variations from Dutch lof; German Lob 'praise'; also Old Saxon liof, Old Frisian liaf, Dutch lief, Old High German liob, German lieb, Gothic liufs 'dear, beloved'. The verb comes from Old English, the verb lufian means 'to feel love for, cherish, show love to; delight in, approve'. Other origins derive from an Indo-European root shared by Sanskrit lubhyati meaning 'desires', in Latin libet 'it is pleasing', libido 'desire'; in Old Frisian luve and luvia.
According to the Oxford definition:
love; noun.
1) an intense feeling of deep affection.
2) a great interest and pleasure in something.
3) a person or thing that one loves.
The concept has existed for hundreds of millions of years. It's been felt, seen, described and depicted in so many mediums: song, film, poetry, sculptures, art… it's part of the human condition. More so- it is one of the defining things that makes us human and is required for our survival - as much as oxygen, as much as water. Probably the most powerful emotion there is and in my opinion at least, it's a requisite lifeforce without which we would cease to exist.
It's almost impossible to fully define and maybe even harder to believe in. Love can be cruel, it can be blind. It can be selfish or selfless. It has the power to heal or wound, to inspire or destroy. It can build you up or tear you apart from the inside. You can make it, take it, give it, waste it, cherish it or throw it away. It's fleeting and fragile but also bold and enduring. It can be mutual or unrequited. It can be a practical joke or a grand gesture. It erodes or grows with time, proving that love is truly complex.
Love is in every single thing we see, smell, touch, taste, hear, and do; it impacts every person around us every second of every minute of every day. Love is a series of contradictions and diametrically opposed factors that confounds me.
Have you ever watched a romantic comedy or read a piece of poetry where there's an epic love story between two people that is so breath taking, so earth shattering, so life altering that you feel it in every cell of your being? People often think these are just stories made up by dreamers and writers with big imaginations who over-romanticize the human condition.
You might believe that a love which is so passionate, so all consuming, so pure that it burns white hot and sucks all the oxygen out of the atmosphere is nothing more than exaggerated fiction, or at least is more rare than a solar eclipse or the formation of a new galaxy. You might even believe that love doesn't exist at all. You'd be wrong.
My name is Finn Hudson and I'm here to tell you that love exists in all those extreme forms and it can be embodied in a single form. I have experienced that rare, unconditional, walk through fire, sing in the rain, written it in the stars, larger than life, impossibly limitless EPIC love. The kind of love that affects your DNA, that alters you, that defines who you are forever. I found that rare and precious love when I was still a boy, merely 16 years old and it permanently changed everything I thought I knew about myself, about people and the world around me. Being so young, it took me a little while to understand what I'd found, but once I did, SHE became the other half of me. She became my reason for EVERYTHING.
Of all the four letter words known to mankind, LOVE is maybe my favorite of all… second only to my first favorite - Rach.
Not convinced? Then allow me to make my case.