Annie Enraux

" I behave in an artificial manner.The only actions involving willpower, desire,and what I it take as human intelligence, were all related to this man..." Enraux's perception of time revolved entirely around A. her life became when A was apart of it and an emptiness when he was gone. she no longer had a present, her time spent looking back at the memories of their time together, or dreaming about how they will spend time together once again.  she never knew when to expect him so she became obsessed with preparing. her constant longing and retracing the steps of the relationship was a bit extreme. she had no concept of the life she was currently living and refused to see past their relationship.she knew what they shared was temporary and that his feelings may not be all that strong for her, because what he was there for was sex. but I suppose  the reason she was so obsessed was because she knew at any moment it could end. in more traditional relationships the opposite occurs, you tend to image that the relationship will last long term and in some cases forever. the thought that every encounter with A could be her last caused her to dissect each moment shared, each moment moving forward was lack of time left.this all relates back to our ongoing conversation about desire. desire is an attempt to fill a lack of something, and her lack was time.

my love by sia

I had quite a bit of trouble picking one song for this assignment. There were so many songs that came to mind from various artiest from different genres and relaying different messages about love, courtship, and heartbreak.but this one makes me emotional every time so I picked one of my favorite songs My Love by Sia. 

Click Here for the Lyrics  

to me this song is about the moment that you give your heart to your lover and then the reciprocation. this song represents ideal love, where both people give and take equally and are able to become better people because of the ways that the lover is able to complement them. This song is also about the surrender of ones self for a lover. the song starts out and also ends with the same lyrics:

MY love

leave yourself behind

beat inside me 

leave you blind 

the line leave your self behind relates to the idea that, when in love you become one with your lover and are no longer are separate entity. When you leave yourself behind you are engulfed by love and are free from any other baggage, all that matter is the here and the now. beat inside me makes reference to the heart. the heart is an organ that is essential to life, so this lyric is meant to convey that this love is such that you cant live without , nor would you want to. leave you blind relates to the idea of rose colored glasses, remain blind to the reality of the other person and the reality of life outside of them.  this song is also about loss; Tonight you will sleep for good... Now I am strong , You gave all you had and now I am home. Throughout our discussion we talked about how death is predominant in love stories because once one obtains desire the only thing left to keep this alive ironically, is death. I think the same idea can be applied here.
But above all this song is beautiful musically, it touches my heart every time I hear it.

It’s easy to say the bad girl treated Ricardo poorly and he loved her so unconditionally so their relationship is one-sided. Maybe it’s the romantic in me, but I feel despite her denial, she felt something strong for Ricardo. The bad girl had the abilities of a chameleon and, she still always allowed Ricardo back in her life. She aspired for more and didn't want to settle down into anything in the fear that she may disappear, but with Ricardo she never had to worry about being less then important. She loved him in the only way that she knew how. It’s not conventional and she can easily be written off as a horrible deceitful woman but with every opportunity to be gone and stay gone she allowed their relationship to pick up where it left off without pause.  She feared that if she let their love run its course their desire would cease, she says on page 209 “you’ll never live quietly with me, I warn you. Because I don’t want you to get tired of me, to get used to me. And even if we marry to straighten out my papers, I’ll never be wife. I always want to be your lover… because I’ll always keep you crazy about me.”

This book reminded me of that obscure object of desire because no matter what Conchita did, Mathiue always went back. The fact that the bad girl like Conchita was always changing, is because it was never just about the women it was about the desire. In each stage of Ricardo’s life the bad girl fit into the Ricardo’s life styles, changing to stylish women of the time.  even at the end of the novel with her impending death, all he wanted from her all along , was to be settled and happy and in his old aged he got exactly that.  This book allowed me to see that desire is fleeting, always changing as you progress, but love is undying and  can stay In the heart dormant, ready to surface at any given moment, fully. Like they always  “distance makes the heart grow founder.” 

The Bad Girl

Lilly’s character is constantly undergoing  change, being the women she needs to be in order to further advance toward the women she wants to be . Even as a teenager she knew that best way to be accepted was to be something new and exciting , representing culture and knowledge. As time passed she matured and become the personification of sophistication, something she always envisioned herself to be.  Her successes are a result of the desire of the men she gets involved with, they offer her the world and in return she lets them THINK she is theirs.  Robert frost once said “love is the irresistible desire to be irresistible desired”.  All of the characters in the books we have read wanted to be desired by their love above all, and that was the fuel for them to continue their pursuit; if I make them love me all will be complete. Lilly is aware of this, she never really gives any of the men in her life the satisfaction of knowing that she desires them as fully as they desire her.  Lilly is called the bad girl, but isn't she just living her life to the fullest never letting the reality of it get to her? She does what she needs to do in order to make a life for herself, not complaining but just doing. I’m not applauding the way in which she does this, but I am applauding her incentive.

Lilly keeps Ricardo around because he loves her unconditionally.  Ricardo makes the same mistake Charles and Mathieu made, desiring too much and being blinded not allowing the reality of the situation create clarity. My question is why do we want to be desired so badly, yet when we are desired to much we feel suffocated and often times end up using that person when we need to make ourselves feel better?