Woman

Most men spend their lives in search of the material, a way out of the conditions they’ve been born into. Status, wealth, opportunity. All these might come their way, causing them to rejoice at their good fortune. Even better if they’ve won the love of a good woman to share the journey.

For centuries, man has taken on heroic struggles in a bid to win the object of his desires. Think of Mark Antony’s celebrated union with Cleopatra, one which cost him his reputation and ultimately his life. Blinded by his infatuation, Antony lost perspective and died in disgrace, his name and image removed from all public records in Rome and across the empire.

The love of a woman is, perhaps, the hardest thing of all to possess. Man can defeat huge armies and lay siege to whole cities, but he cannot demand this most mysterious and elusive of treasures. This privilege he must earn – sometimes without effort on his part – and, realising his apparent blessing, must seek to hold on to his prize and prevent it from being taken.

Then comes the day when it all goes wrong. Our hero realises his prize isn’t quite what she seems. She’s elusive and wilful, but in ways he can’t understand. He wants her perhaps a little too much. That sense of comfortable superiority he once had has gone. She’s become a stranger, someone whose love for him has vanished seemingly overnight.

Writers and sociologists have often remarked upon the fragile male ego. Man the hunter, who discovers hidden continents but is unable to master that greatest of riddles – the female psyche. He remains at best, a poor bewildered creature, looking for validation in ways it can’t be given.

The differences between men and women have been debated for centuries. As a species we’re essentially the same – we eat the same food, share the same genetic makeup and breathe the same air. But one area highlights our differences more than any other.

Communication.

The conflict that often results from this fundamental disharmony acts like a drug upon the senses. We feel that we can’t do away with the drama, the excitement. What a symphony it creates. What music! Then, when the source is removed, we’re left distraught, as if a limb had been torn from us.

To be alone in this world is the essential truth for all of us, no matter our wealth or status. Even surrounded by those we love, we cannot avoid the certainty that at some point we must die alone. We are disconnected and insular, small islands in the stream of life, desperate for a lasting connection.

This hole deep within us can never really be filled, except momentarily perhaps when caught in some great rapture. During such times we’re reminded of the central mystery of life, that in spite of our apparent insignificance, we are actually a part of it.

Love – the great distraction, food of poets and musicians ever since Adam squandered his inheritance in the Garden of Eden. To be ‘in love’, that most prized and illusive condition that heals the wounds of separation and unites man and woman as one. There is no substitute for it, no material gain that can match its seductive power.

What is a man without a woman? Stripped of his birthright and no longer relevant in any shape or form, he is in effect half the equation. He looks for sustenance in other areas but is thwarted repeatedly. Instead, he knows loneliness and separation, the basic pointlessness of his own existence as he heads for the stone cold grave.

This absence creates a yearning he wears like a cloak. The female form appears to him as a vision, a creature of unmatchable allure, whose charms seem always reserved for someone else. He feels his loss painfully, publicly even. This goddess he reveres so much sits atop a citadel which cannot be breached. She looks down on him from her lofty perch, somewhat aloof, smiling at his misfortune.

But love always has the last word. Just when he feels the winter of his discontent, our poor dispirited hero gets a last minute reprieve. He looks up, and there she is. The iceberg melts. Years of pain and disillusion are finally over. With joy in his heart, he finds himself once more in the land of the living.