Love?

Jalima, I often liken Prince Charles and Camilla's relationship and eventual marriage to that of John of Gaunt and Katherine Swynford.

But then maybe I read far too many historical romance novels in my teens.

hasty google …..

merlot, Anya Seton's 'Katherine' is one of my favourite novels of all time and one of only a handful that I have re-read several times.

merlotgran I have recently been trying to find an audio version of the classic, Katherine' but it seems no such thing exists. Such a wonderful writer deserves to have all her books recorded.

merlotgran, I read 'Katherine' as a young woman which then prompted me to read Seton's other books. You are spot on about the similarity to Charles and Camilla, who'd have thought that all those years ago.
We've been married 42 years in July and have had our ups and downs. We have always had a sense of humour which continues to sustain us. I still love the man I married but I like him a lot.

Sometimes the mundane gets in the way if the real way we should be living our lives.we accept that we've been together a long time and spjust muster along.mive been married the same time as you and we're still working hard and life somehow seems to be slipping by not having enough time together is our problem.

'Katherine' the novel is just that - a novel. Read Alison Weir's 'Katherine Swynford, for the real story - and her very thoughtful comments about the novel.

I am deeply suspicious of historical novels. I have both Katherine and Desiree (another 'romance' of the same period) on my bookshelves. I have recently read a biography of General Bernadotte, whom Desiree married and, again, reality is very different to fiction.

I too loved Katherine!

We have been married 48 years a and I still get a thrill when DH comes home when he has been out.

I am always shocked to realise how long we have been together. DH proposed after 6 weeks and we married after 10 months. I just wonder where all the years have gone.

We are very lucky that we have grown together and supported each other over the years. We have had awful times as well as good times. We have had some dreadful arguments but always know that we are meant to be together.

We are very lucky.

Rereading my post's of last night, when I was tired and not fully over the lurgy, I realise what I wrote made my own marriage, sound very ho-hum. It isn't.

It is just I was born with feet of very soggy clay and I have always been uneasy about the way people bandy emotional language around with no real thought or consideration of what they mean exactly. I have, over the years on GN queried what exactly words like 'forgiveness' or 'guilt' mean - and I am still none the wiser.

What I am trying to get to is the solid residuum under all the high flown emotional language. Surely emotions have roots in something. I just struggle to work out what it is.

Love is such a difficult word to define. I have been with DH 54 years and some might say that we are in love. I don’t think I would call it love.

I certain did not love him when I married him. I married because my lovely dad was dying and I needed to escape from my mother. Over the years I had times when I was very fond of him, times when I wished I was not married and now I think we are friends.

I think I am too much of a realist for love. I can recognise that the problems of our marriage were the fault of both of us a different times. The strength of the marriage is because we respect each other. On the surface we seem compatible but deep down he is a very cold person and that is hard for me sometimes.

littleflo

Like faith, love is a decision for many of us.

And no one likes to admit they were wrong. So, stick with it and find new ways to demonstrate your love. It may even be reciprocated but that is not the reason we decide to love.

Katherine is available on Audible you can also buy the Audible version from Amazon

I know exactly what you mean , watching them sitting in chair , no conversation . You begin to wonder if this is all there is to life . The thought of actually going on holiday with my husband , feels me with dread . I look forward to him going out , for some peace . which is a bit mad being there's no conversation . would I be without him , I don't know . You know what they say , they are like a old pair of slippers . which you don't want to swap because the new pair might pinch . Good luck.

youtu.be/h_y9F5St4j0
MOnica I'm a bit of a loner too, needing unusually long stretches of time on my own.

My feelings are the same as Doodle's and Paddyann.

I was married for 54 years and we were really in love. He was briefly attracted to someone at his work who was 18 years younger. I was briefly attracted t o a handsome man I met at an OU course. In neither case did anything physical come of it. My husband told me about the girl at work and I was upset. I never told him about the man on the course, as I did not want to hurt him. As one of my friends put it, "Married, but not paralysed." You can be attracted to somebody else occasionally.
Once those things were out of the way we realised that we still loved each other and it lasted all the years until his severe dementia which tested my love for him... he was so changed.
Love lasts, physical attraction doesn't.

May I point out that the words of the wedding service date back to a time when marriages were not based on love, but arranged based on a number of other factors and when most couples believed that respect and liking was something to be worked at and the best you were likely to get in marriage.

I believe you can run out of love, or that love can die. If this happens in a marriage it depends whether there is friendship, liking or respect that makes the marriage worth going on with and whether love could be born again.

All marriages go through bad patches and we grin and bear it until things get better again. If they don't you need to consider whether there is a better alternative.

I’ve been married for nearly 45 years, and shortly after first meeting my husband, I sensed deeply that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him. Last year he was very ill, and I ached to climb onto the hospital bed to hold him. Not possible because of all the necessary kit he was plugged into.
I wanted to reaffirm our bond.
So I’d call love a deep bonding - an alchemy.

I guess when love dies the marriage then just becomes one of convenience.

Yes, you can run out of love. Married for 47 years, I know that I no longer love my husband. He is now a miserable old so-and-so. He shows me no physical affection. The trouble is that I have no one else in the family to turn to and my financial stability would be seriously affected if I left. So I stick it out and see as little of him as is possible living under the same roof. Although we have discussed my unhappiness I don't think he has any idea how I really feel,

Love changes over the years. It may not be as passionate as it once was and settles into something more temperate. It's still love.

Quizzer - ditto!

DH & I must be some of the lucky ones - still in love & having a happy life together, after 36 years. I once read an interesting saying: "All happy marriages end unhappily". Now that's food for thought.....makes me value every day we have together. (If we didn't enjoy life together, then we'd part, no question.)

I was married to "the love of my life" for almost 21 years until his death 6 years ago, our marriage was one full of love & passion. I feel his loss very much but I am not a "grieving widow", I have a new life full of happy memories & new friends.

This was my 3rd marriage, H no1 was a controlling man, marriage lasted 8 months. H no2 I met whilst we were still married to other people. Started with love & passion, my beautiful DD was born, we lived together for several years before marrying. Thought this is it, then we married, lasted 15 months before he left me for an older woman.

Love does change from those heady beginnings but often becomes a deeper feeling for many.