Pat and Max had been working together for some time now.
Pat feels something ... definite ... undeniable ... heart-fluttering ... towards Max. Pat cannot deny the arousals felt when Max is present, even if just in thoughts ...
Pat has never felt this way before, it is the very first time ... is it love?
One day, Pat summoned the courage to tell Max about these feelings ...
Max listened, and after a while, said seriously that the sentiment is not mutual.
To be continued ... in alternative paths ...
Storyline # 01
ReplyDeletePat's full name is Patrick.
Max's full name is Maximillian.
Even though nothing came from the relationship, Pat thinks himself now as a gay, or perhaps a bisexual.
Storyline # 02
ReplyDeletePat's full name is Patrick.
Max's full name is Maxime.
Even though nothing came from the relationship, Pat continues to assume he's normal, a heterosexual. Being a gay, or a bi, never crossed his mind.
Storyline # 01 - continued as 01.01
ReplyDeletePat considers himself gay. All his friends and people he spoke to affirm it.
Some thinks his feelings, if Maxmillian had accepted, could be the base of a mutually loving relationship.
Others think his feelings, regardless of whether Max accepted, was lust, because they believe that's what homosexual passions is about - sexual lust.
Storyline #02 - continued as 02.01
ReplyDeletePat decides to move on.
Whatever he felt for Maxime, he told himself he'd get over it, and he'd find some other girl ... someday.
After all ... it's just a feeling ... it could have developed into love ... but it was not recripocated.
Maybe it's just ... lust ... not pure lusting of Max, he did like Max, but still, the primary passion had been sexual in nature ...
Storyline #02 - continued as 02.02
ReplyDeletePat decides he'd continue to hold the torch for Maxime.
After all, true love doesn't need to be recripocated, right?
He just wants Max to be happy. He doesn't demand to be loved the same way in return.
That's what true love is all about, isn't it?
If you love somebody, let her go. If she's meant to be yours, she'll be back ...
Right?
Storyline # 01 - continued as 01.02
ReplyDeletePat is confused ... he'd never thought he was a gay, until developing feelings for Maxmillian.
He was never attracted to other guys before, Max was the first.
After some time passed after the initial rejection, he did find some guys ... interesting ...
And then ... Maximillian told him that ... she was really a girl who disguised herself as man, a la Victor/Victoria ...
Pat is even more confused ... is he heterosexual after all ...?
Was his feelings a subconscious response to relating to Max's real sexual identity?
Storyline # 02 - continued as 02.03
ReplyDeletePat was trying to deal with his rejection when Maxime springs a bombshell to him ...
Maxime ... is really Maximillian ... who for his own reasons, refusing to verify whether he was dressed as a woman for "undercover assignment" ... or he was contemplating transgender operations ...
Was Pat's initial feelings to Maxime then just a sexual lust for whom he thought was a woman ... and he had been deceived?
Or was it true feelings for Max, regardless of Max's sexual identity ...
Was Pat really then a gay?
Or was Pat really "in love" with Max, regardless of whether Max was a man or a woman ...?
Intermission 01 - Breaking the fourth wall
ReplyDeleteThings were so much simpler in ancient times of Greece, Rome and China and many other parts of the world ...
A man then need not concern himself whether he was heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual.
His liking, or loving, for another person, was directed at the person, without prejudice to the sexual identity of the other party.
If the person happens to be a woman, then so be it, marry her and have children with her.
And if the person happens to be a man, then so be it too. Nobody frowned what they do together, as long as he did his duty to his family, e.g., siring sons as required by aristocrats in ancient China.
Story to be continued ...
Whoa.
ReplyDeleteI can indentify with so many of those feelings.
Initially, I planned to do 2 other storylines, and this time, the initiator, Pat, is Patricia ...
ReplyDeleteBut initial ideas for Patricia subsumed in some of the earlier posts, so I'm still working on it, thinking along the lines what difference would it be when it is a woman who develops feelings first ...
Does a woman has more perceptive intuition about the other party she develops feelings for?
Can a woman really be deceived whether the other party is male or female?
I once heard that a man and a woman initiate break up differently.
Can't recall exactly what it was for the man, but when a woman 变心, it is really 变心 and there's no return.
It's supposed to be because a woman is suppose to know better her own feelings, whether it is "Real" ...
No, its just that women are more 狠心... we men tend to have a soft spot for all our past loves.
ReplyDeleteSnowy I don't really get what you are trying to do here, you are trying to come up with a script for a drama and exploring ideas?
ReplyDeletePossibly.
ReplyDeleteWell, if I ever finish it, it'll be a script that'd stump even Wong Kar-Wai.
ReplyDeleteBut no, that's not the idea anyway.
What I really have in mind is to delve into whether typecasting a person's attraction to another person as heterosexual/homosexual creates prejudice in the person's mind, and reinforced by prejudices created in the minds of those around him.
A person can of course feel attraction to the opposite sex, without a particular person in mind.
Example would be teen guys attracted to the girls, the mental image of girls in cheerleader outfits or less. But they may have no particular person in mind as the "target".
These feelings are attributed largely to hormones, no one will really say it's love ... lust, maybe.
Now, the same feelings can exist towards the same sex.
But it's not love, is it?
The possibility of love, IMO, is only credible when it is towards a particular person, not towards a particular gender.
If Pat feels love towards Max, does this "love" have anything to do with whether they are of the same gender?
Many writers before Snowybeagle have written of persons falling in love with someone from the opposite sex, only to be revealed later their target is actually of the same gender. E.g., Twelfth Night by Shakespeare.
One Taiwanese TV series starring Elle from S.H.E. even did the opposite, a guy who thought he fell in love with another guy, and accepting he is a gay.
As I see it, there's really no difference between their feelings of love from the feelings of love between Romeo and Juliet.
By today, due to historical baggages, there's a lot of warped perceptions about love, love between opposite sex, and love between the same sex.
I feel it led to religious persecution based on non-religious sources, and in many sections of Christianity, unjustifiable severity in reacting to homosexual passions as compared to heterosexual passions.
Raymond Feist, in his book "Talon of the Silverhawk", has a passage where the mentors of the protagonist tried to teach him the difference between love and lust. It's a very good passage.
I am not neutral about homosexuality. But I want to distinguish between disapproval of homosexuality based on faith, from homophobia, showing that many of the condemnations of homosexual feelings is just as applicable to heterosexual feelings.
I've found that one falls in love with a person, not their gender.
ReplyDeleteYes, that seems to be the case made to uphold that love can exists between members of the same sex.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I found a different perspective mentioned by Feist more ... convincing ... that love is not based on how one feels at the moment, or even over an extended period ...
I'll try to find the book again, 'cos I don't want to mess it up. It was a very powerful argument in challenging that unless people have been together for years and really continuously did things (tedious, mundane, mind drudging) to take care of each and other and for their family, the love between them is ... open to question.
Going by that stringent definition, the love felt by a couple during their wedding vows don't qualify.
I can't say I know many same-sex couples, and none who actually continued together after making their equivalent of marriage commitment.
It would not be fair on that alone to say that same-sex couple don't have the love it takes different-sex couples to last. Many heterosexual couples lasted a long time, and even lauded as exemplrary marriages, before breaking up. Today's media seldom reported on marriages that last. I guess the old adage of not asking whether a man is happy until he's dead applies.
Far be it that I have no confidence in marriage or have doubts about my love for my wife, this is about not taking surface appearances for granted. Couples who are happy worked for it to happen, the work coming naturally to some, but requiring paradigm shift in most today.
I don't like the work of his that I have read so far but I will seek out Flight of the Silverhawk.
ReplyDeleteMy pastor's wife once remarked that she felt no especial romantic or sentimental love towards my pastor during and even after their courtship, but what she had for him was utmost respect.
ReplyDeleteFor her, it was that respect that fuelled what would ultimately become the deep and abiding love she grew for him.
It's true, even if it is a "case".
ReplyDeleteNote: just a correction, the passage from Feist I recalled was from Talon of the Silver Hawk (2003). There's no Flight of the Silver Hawk by Feist, but there is a Flight of the Nighthawks (2006). My mind wasn't working very well when I composed it.
ReplyDeleteI found the book in the library today, but I didn't borrow it, just copied the most pertinent paragraph to my mobile.
Background : the protagonist was trained to be an undercover agent to avenge the massacre of his entire clan. As part of the training, his heart was deliberately broken.
“Think about this for a while: remember the quiet times when your father and mother were caring for you and your family. That’s love. Not the passion of the moment in the arms of a willing woman.” Magnus to Talon, Chapter 13: Recovery, Talon of the Silver Hawk
I believe passion do have a role in love, but it is not, in the long run, what determines whether a relationship developes into true love or just a passing fancy.
What would happen to passion and physical attraction if tomorrow the other person is struck down with disfigurement?
A very valid point.
ReplyDeletePassion does not equal love, yet many mistake that for love.