IN LOVE with Alexandra Gheorghe
How we met: Sometimes it is in the way someone says “Yes” that makes you feel instantly connected.
In darker periods of my life, the future had appeared like a desert to me, a vast land without a stone in sight behind which help could hide and walking it felt daunting. This vast stoneless land is still what I see - but I walk in the knowing that out of seemingly nowhere people, insights, changes,… arise.
Alexandra and I met at a virtual check-in of Berlin based creative collective Co-Creagency during the April lockdown. We were talking about the shifts in our lives and how we know that we have changed. For me, the desert image expresses this shift. And the way Alexandra said “Yes” felt as if she was feeling the same.
We were both building our websites at the time and gave each other brutally honest feedback. We met on Instagram for lunch and wore filters. We both love Paris and chansons. One day I posted a quote in a story: “I want the I-make-a- mixtape-for-you-kind-of-love. The next day, Alexandra had made a mixtape for me on Spotify.
Alexandra writes personal and brutally honest film reviews. In her c’mon writing workshops, she immerses her students into characters, worlds and states of being that unlock another level of their writing potential.
Alexandra on Instagram
1 _ _ _ _
Imagine that from this moment on, the verb "to love" does not exist anymore. How do you express yourself when you feel love? In words, actions?
"Non-existent four-letter word" cannot be fully experienced and felt unless backed up by actions. I am a writer, and I'd like to think that my quest is doing justice to words - but I cannot let them win this one.
I think this contest ends in a tie. I'd be naturally inclined to say that actions speak louder than words, but I've experienced actions devoid of words and it has been (almost) just as painful. To me it is vital to constantly show and give "non-existent four letter word" by forming a symbiosis between the two.
And how would I express that? Most probably by recommending a film, sending a review on that film, making a playlist, making a cover for the playlist, cooking, cooking your favorite dish, telling you how much love I carry around for you, sending you poems by E.E. Cummings (a must!), communicating my feelings and thoughts regularly and honestly, ... more films, more poems, ...
2 Out of LOVE: 575,3 km away from Berlin, in an almost-city populated by 230,000 people, I experienced great lack and loss - lack of love and loss of meaning. At that point I was already struggling for four years to catch roots in a place that had none of the prerequisites for my emotional and mental growth. Sense-making was something I was no longer mastering; drinking coffee at the same cafe each morning was as far as certainty was going; moviegoing remained a darling, but oh what a knotty one.
In the midst of that vacuum, I was willing - worryingly willing - to sacrifice "X" in return for love. I thought I'd know what "X" is once I'd encounter this subject, this person, who is presumably ready to embrace my willingness. I did meet this person and I did sacrifice "X".
But in return I only received the lack of love and loss of meaning.
I was afraid of almost anything (sleeping, eating alone, being over-caffeinated, writing a single line, talking about my grief, etc.). But behind all that, a deeply grounded fear of change and uncertainty was hiding. And behind that fear and uncertainty meaning was hiding. And behind meaning, love was hiding.
And behind this text, I am hiding. It's a tad difficult (actually I wanted to say impossibly difficult) to trace back any concrete thoughts. It's all stored in my mind as a fuzzy dream (and beware, I am not calling it a nightmare because even nightmares make more sense than a blurry, all over the place dream). It's a fuzzy dream that I've decided to remember as such. The only certainty I have about that dream is that it felt like a mosaic whose pieces have been stolen and drowned in a canal, somewhere between Groningen and Amsterdam.
3 Returning into LOVE
When you have been out of Love, how do you help yourself to re-enter?
I was only able to re-enter love once I exited and eradicated the origin of loss and grief. The forced idea that I "had to" catch roots in a place that was simply not working out for me eventually got me to drive 575,3 km away.
- to Berlin.
Berlin was kind. Berlin is still so very kind to me.
How is it possible to find all the shattered pieces you left behind in a place that's so far away? And how is it possible that they can become so beautifully re-arranged in an extremely short timespan?
Probably the expression "out of sight, out of mind" makes a lot of sense in my fragmentary situation. Physical distance, along with the decision to allow myself to grow somewhere else, helped me find so many types of love. Love I didn't even know existed. Love for myself, love for sisterhood, love for communities, love for the love of my life.
:) :) :) :) :) :)
Thank you, Berlin, for these warm arms you always hold me into.
4 Almost Lovers
Let me start by saying what an almost lover is for me. An almost lover is a person, with whom you feel SO yourself, SO creative, SO in love that you feel - this is my life partner. However, an almost lover does not want to be with you. Did you have an experience like this? And if so - did your almost love story lead to important inner and outer transformations in your life that you are now grateful for? Which are your favorite two ones?
My dear Mirjam,
This question is very difficult to answer (for me). I have an almost lover, but since this experience took place last year, I find it very difficult to talk about it from this perspective. I am not attaching negative feelings to it, but when it comes to pinning it down... It's still really painful.
That's why I sound mysterious and quite elusive in my other answers. I guess I am still figuring out what love is :), and that's okay! I hope you can understand this. I know you will.
You can actually even post this as an answer, I wouldn't mind.
5 LOVE Quotes:
There are many love-quotes out there. Which is your favorite one on true romantic love - and why?
"With the whole world crumbling, we pick this time to fall in love." - Ilsa in Casablanca (1942, directed by Michael Curtiz)