It's something I have recently discovered. Love Memory is not the same as Just Memory. It's something that seems to accumulate in my body - like radiation. Maybe we can get love-burned just like we can get sun-burned. And if we expose ourselves to too much of it, it might develop into something malignant. Which is why they say that love is so close to hate. 

I'm one of the lucky ones, with sun-bearing olive skin and a love-bearing heart. But as I go to the dermatologist every year for a check-up - just to make sure everything is okay, I wonder how I could make sure all things happening in my heart and soul are safe and harmless.

And why is it that so much of our love memory is associated with pain and loss? Is it for everyone, or just for those who are love-sensitive? Is there something in our genes - like there is when it comes to sun-exposure - that makes us more or less sensitive to love-pain?

I remember, last time I had a painful medical procedure after a pretty rough shoulder injury, the doctor said he would give me a valium so I won't remember the pain. I laughed. I will remember everything, I thought. And I do. But I don't feel it. I remember the needles, I remember the crackling sound of my joints, I remember thinking wow, this hurts more that I thought it would... but I can't feel the pain. Can't feel it at all. The fear is in my body though - to go through it again, to feel what I can't feel now but would have to feel again - the fear has never left. 

What is it about love that makes me fearless? As if I had taken some pill that helped me forget all the pain, all the loss, disappointment. Maybe it's just love itself. What else could it be? When I fall in love or deeply love someone it's like taking a love-pill. It's like Valium except better. It doesn't just make me forget what was hurtful but it also helps me remember everything that was wonderful. 

And then all the love I have shared with people in my life can accumulate and add up to something that can fill me with fearless  hunger to experience more of it. To share more of it. 

All the pain, or at least most of it, is in the past. Forgotten, lonely, powerless.

Perhaps it's a simple survival instinct. Perhaps a choice as well.

Just think about it - what do you remember when you remember love?