Every Love Has A Song
On love, memory, and the courage to begin again
I’ve alwasys loved the song The Lady in Red by Chris de Burgh. There's something about the idea of remembering exactly what someone wore, how they looked, and how it felt to see them that evening.I
It's remarkable what stays with us. We forget conversations, dates, sometimes entire chapters of our lives. Yet we remember the color of someone's shirt the first time we met, the way they smiled, or the song that happened to be playing.
I've come to realize that I have a song for nearly every man I've dated, loved, or even briefly imagined loving.
The first was either P.S. I Love You by Sharon Cuneta or This Time I'll Be Sweeter. I've never been entirely sure which.
I was young, and a teacher decided that a boy from our class and I should sing love songs together in front of everyone (it was a thing in the Philippines). I was mortified. He wasn't. He just smiled sweetly and carried on, as if standing there singing to me were the most natural thing in the world.
I've forgotten the song. I've never forgotten the smile.
There have been many since. To name some (in no particular order): First Love. Kailanman. You're Beautiful. Lucky. I Knew I Loved You. Lonely Night in Georgia. It Must Have Been Love. Because You Loved Me. You Were Meant For Me. Autumn Leaves. Foolish Games. Aïcha. No One Knows About a Good Thing. Autumn Moon on a Calm Lake. Broken Angel. Apologize. And, I'm a little embarrassed to admit, I Need a Girl.
Some of those relationships lasted. Others barely began. Some ended beautifully, others painfully. And a few probably should never have happened at all. I'll let you guess where P. Diddy fits.
But the songs remain.
Sometimes I hear one unexpectedly, in a restaurant, while driving, somewhere in the background of an otherwise ordinary day, and I'm transported back. Not necessarily to the relationship itself, but to the beginning: the excitement, the anticipation, the wonderful uncertainty of not knowing what might happen next. The possibility that this person, this moment, might become something meaningful.
And I remember myself, too. Who I was then. What mattered to me. What I hoped for. The woman I was becoming.
Even when a relationship ended badly, I rarely hear its song as a reminder of failure. More often, I feel affection. For the memories, certainly. Sometimes even for the men themselves. But especially for the younger versions of myself who were willing to try.
I've always had a particular fondness for courage.
When I was seventeen, during the question-and-answer portion of a beauty pageant (yes, I did those), I was asked which was more important: wisdom or courage. I chose courage. I explained that it is only through courage that we attempt things, experience life, make mistakes, learn, grow, and eventually gain wisdom.
I don't know whether I fully understood that answer at seventeen. But all these years later, I still believe it.
Experience has changed me, of course. I've become more discerning. I recognize patterns I once overlooked. I've learned that chemistry isn't necessarily compatibility, that longing isn't always love, and that some relationships are better left as possibilities.
I've learned, too, that courage doesn't always mean taking the leap. Sometimes it means walking away.
But I hope that becoming wiser doesn't require becoming less open to life.
After disappointment, it's tempting to look back at our younger selves with embarrassment. How could I have believed that? Why didn't I see what was happening? What was I thinking?
I've asked those questions, too. But increasingly, I answer them with something gentler: compassion, sometimes amusement, and a surprising amount of respect. For the woman who hoped. Who occasionally misjudged. Who sometimes knew better and tried anyway. Who let herself feel excitement without knowing how the story would end.
I don't feel the need to explain away those versions of myself. They were all me.
Perhaps that's one of the gifts of growing older. I'm less interested in presenting a perfectly consistent version of myself, and more willing to admit the contradictions. I can be thoughtful and impulsive, cautious and romantic, independent and still moved by the possibility of connection. I can know that love sometimes hurts and still find myself smiling at the beginning of something new.
And I can look back on relationships that didn't last without wishing I'd never had them.
Not every encounter needs to become a lifelong relationship to have mattered. Some people enter our lives for a season. Others for a moment, like a boy who smiled and kept on singing. A few stay with us in ways neither of us could have anticipated.
And sometimes all it takes is a familiar melody to remind me that, once upon a time, I was hopeful, excited, and wonderfully alive.
I think many of us miss that more than we admit. Not the heartbreak, certainly. But the recklessness. The impetuousness. The delicious audacity of believing something wonderful might happen.
I've lived enough to know that not every beginning becomes a love story. But I hope I never become too wise to be excited by one. And if there's a next time, I'd like to think I'll be sweeter.
If you're reading this and wondering whether there's a song that reminds me of you...
Well, perhaps there is.
