It's funny how society has made this beautiful ideal of love; how our parents tell us of love; even how at school we talk of love and getting married. It's become something that just "must happen."

But do we really know love? Is the bliss of love, its virgin purity, actually there? No, it's not. At least for most people it isn't. People have lost the value of love; the term "love" has become "who can provide what I need/crave/desire?" It's about gaining. About asking for something.

This has happened since the beginning of the concept of romanticism and especially marriage; in old times, royalties married royalties to prevent warfare, a peasant girl married a worker so she could be provided for, and men married women who had skills in homemaking and child raising.

In basic terms, you had to get something out of it, whether it is a rich man's providing, a woman's body, or a rose every now and then. Even today, your parents won't be too happy if your fianc� has a job as a 7-Eleven store clerk, or if your bride-to-be doesn't want children. Love has to be something that provides for you in one way or another.

What people don't understand is that love provides for itself. Can you recall those first days that you were in love with someone, when the days seemed brighter alone? You wake up and breathe joy. You need nothing because your heart feels full with everything great. There is nothing as exquisite on this planet as loving.