The young journalist was interviewing me for a feature she was working on, on the intriguing topic of whether senior citizens like myself are capable of romance. Her editor must have given her the assignment following a well publicized international survey on how the amatory and erotic impulse persists even in octogenarians. Having read about my single, independent status, maintained determinedly over the nearly 30 years since my divorce, despite an active social life, she came out at last with the crucial question: ‘Have you ever fallen in love?’ I said in effervescent good spirits, ‘Make your question, ‘Do you often fall in love?’ and I’ll answer, ‘With alarming regularity!’

The young journalist scribbled down in her pad ‘With alarming regularity’, and asked me to explain.

I fall in love, that is, get all excited, feel my heart beat faster, feel my cheeks getting hotter—all the conventionally accepted marks of that supreme human experience—whenever I meet certain types of men.

Never mind if one type exists only in novels. In novels written long ago. By women whose very proscribed lives meant they had very little real experience of men. By women who were bound by the propriety of their times to subject any overwhelming passion to the disciplining power of their pen.

I remember how I first fell in love with the heroes in the novels of Jane Austen (I continue to swoon over them with each re-reading of the novels) They were exactly the type that convent girls like myself, often retreating into the private, romantic world of our imagination as a reaction against the strictures of convent life, had a special partiality for—strong, intelligent, fine-mannered, dignified, much-respected men (They were, moreover, always tall, handsome and wealthy) Which Jane Austen fan has not swooned over Darcy in ‘Pride and Prejudice’ and Knightley in ‘Emma’?

‘Does that mean,’ asked the interviewer, ‘that you have never fallen in love with a real man?’

I told her of two instances when I fell in love with real men alright, in the first instance for exactly the duration of a cocktail party, and in the second instance, without ever meeting him.

The first encounter: I was at a writers’ conference some years ago when I suddenly noticed, going through the conference brochure, that one of the participants was a Physics professor from a leading American university. A man of science who was also a novelist? I had never met such an intriguing combination. I quickly bought a copy of his novel, and was enthralled by the elegance of his style. Seeking him out at a party that evening, I shamelessly declared, ‘I’ve read your novel and I’m half in love with you already. If you will explain to me Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle, that will be the other half!’ and he grinned and said, ‘Sure’. The infatuation, lasting as long as the informal lecture, was very real.

The second encounter: one day I happened to read a newspaper report about the founder of the remarkable DFS or Duty Free Shops. There was only a very grainy picture of him; indeed he would have remained in total obscurity if there had not been some legal matter that required his appearance at court. But what I read about him brought on instantly those reliable indicators of the falling-in–love state—the excitement, the quickening heart beat, the flushed cheeks.

Here was a man who over twenty years had donated millions to charity, but who lived the simplest life imaginable, owning no house, no car, wearing the most inexpensive shirts. I remember the report mentioning that his watch had cost fifty dollars, and then quickly correcting its own inaccurate reporting—the watch had cost exactly $30. I thought to myself, ‘I really would like to meet this man and talk to him over dinner. Even if it means having to pay for the dinner!’

It’s a hopeless situation, but I know, being an incorrigible romantic, that I will continue to fall in love with men, whether in fact or fiction, who embody the highest imperatives of intellect and nobility.

‘You fall in love with men you’ve never met or will never see again?’ said the young journalist incredulously. I had to remind her that falling in love wasn’t the same as loving; it could afford to remain cloud-borne.

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About Vignettes...

A continuing flow of little, readable pieces that will constitute what I feel is an important 'legacy of values' to leave behind. Read more about Vignettes...