jane eyre

Watched the 2011 movie version of one of my favorite books from my teenage years, Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre. There are no filmed versions of the book that capture all of it, but this one comes closest. The only missing piece in this one is Mr. Rochester's geniality, hinted at but not really shown; it's hard to imagine why Jane says she has been happy near him. For me, happiness has to include laughter, and this Jane and Edward don't laugh much.

But the staying power of the story, the reason it compels and has been popular for 100 years, is not humor. It's their connection. It's Rochester telling Jane that he has a thread attached to his heart that attaches to hers, and that if they are separated, he fears it will break. It's the recognition of the other. The kindred soul.

I mentioned a while back that love is the recognition of one's self in the other. That's what Jane and Edward have. And that's what we all want, at least those of us who love the book. For the rest of my life, Jane's story will be my picture of the ideal relationship.

Here is where this narrative should shift, where I should say, "but of course, an ideal is not real." But I won't believe that. For forty years, I have believed in Jane's story. My heart, my gut tell me that the soul match can exist. I am not certain whether my brain believes that I will find it. But my heart believes it can happen to others, and my stomach will not let go of the idea that I ought to have it too.

I was struggling to find a goal. I was trying to find how I should choose. But if everything I have done is a choice, whether conscious or not, then I already have a goal and I have simply not listened to it. My brain had only the absence of a goal -- a not-a-goal. I thought about relationships and what I missed in mine. I thought about my ex-lover, how he made me laugh, how I felt energy in the connection. I wondered how I could find that again.

But -- and this is a fine line to draw -- we are not looking for a person to make the relationship exist. We are looking for the relationship. If a friend tells me that he prefers Asian women because they convey a sense of mystery and excitement to him, it does not mean that to find what he wants he has to look for an Asian woman. It means that he wants his relationship to have mystery and excitement.

So how do I state what I want in terms of a relationship and not a person?

I find I still think in terms of a negative: what I don't want. So shall I start with what I have? Comfort. Understanding of a different sort: familiarity and kindness. Regard. Yes I want these, but they describe the relationship Jane has with her cousin St. John Rivers, the man she refuses to marry. He is like a brother to her. So if Jane's story is my ideal, then how do I describe what she has?

Laughter. Excitement. Energy. Connection. Understanding, and yes, the recognition of the self in the other. An understanding that we are understood. Sexual passion. The ability to tease. The leaping up of the heart at the other's presence.