In the beginning, they sweep you off your feet, quoting Shakespeare. For example this conversation between myself and Mr K (c.1998) which, for obvious reasons, I have never forgotten and still brings a smile to my face…
Borys: “Would you like to come to my Mum’s, for dinner tonight?”
Mr K: “Oh, I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, be buried in thy
eyes… and moreover, yes, I will go with thee to thy mother’s!” *cheeky grin*
But over time, the sonnets and pithy word play disappears and the day to day grind of him bringing home the bacon, and me pretending to cook it, and us subsequently arguing over who is going to clean up it up… kind saps one’s energy for quoting Shakespeare at your beloved right out of you, for some reason. Why is that, I wonder?
That the longer you are together, and the more comfortable you are with someone, and the more time you spend in each other’s company – the less effort we seem to put into the little things that amuse one another? And instead we fall into a happy, but less heady, equilibrium where the romantic gestures and pithy one-liners from ‘Much Ado About Nothing’ only come out for Valentines Day cards or perhaps over breakfasts on your wedding anniversary! Sigh… it’s just unacceptable.
There should be more wooing within marriage, I say!
There should be more flowery speeches, more grandiose language, and more theatrical declarations of one’s intentions to dine at one’s mother in law’s home! Oh, by the way gentlemen before you get carried away wooing your ladies with bounteous and beneficent declarations of undying love and devotion… beware of cheap imitations!
