Love Is All You Need, Unless You're A Lizard

Unless my memory is playing tricks or I'm channeling a past life in which I was also a loser, the first time I was abused by Cupid was in nursery school, which would make me four and a half at the time.

There was this little girl with big eyes and a beautiful smile who just knocked me out. I wanted to do things for her, like stick orange quarters in my mouth and smile and roll my eyes like a deranged pumpkin.

I would do anything for her approval , but as I was dragged off by the nuns to go sit in the corner, I heard her say: "He thinks he's my boyfriend or something." Tosses her hair: "I don't know what gave him THAT idea!"

By now, we all know the toll that kind of childhood trauma can take. After a shellacking like that, I could have turned into the Marquis de Sade or Bill Clinton, but it just made me hopeless in the presence of otherwise unambiguous signals.

By the time I reached young adulthood, I had missed a lot of clear, convenient opportunities and instead threw myself like a bug at the windshield of unrequited love. The more hopeless it was, the more compelled I was to scale the balcony intent on committing romanticide.

For some reason, I attracted kind, sympathetic, lovely, girl-next-door types who I completely ignored, remaining hopelessly attracted to these hair-tossing Jezebels, who were -- at best -- amused by my clumsy, pained attentions.

There was Vivienne, who tormented me with the slight possibility that she might consider me as an alternative boyfriend. Fat chance -- not only was the A team leader old enough to drive, he drove a Cadillac convertible.

There was Rhonda, whose father wouldn't let her go out with boys who weren't Jewish. If I thought it would do me any good I would have submitted to the sharp end of the initiation rite.

There was Leah. Everything about her was perfect, except a previously unmentioned boyfriend who turned up uninvited on a date on a Harley with a gun. I escaped but never saw Leah or her Hawg again. I never even saw that part of town again.

Then there was Karen. We wasted years smiling shyly at each other across the congregation (thank you Karen for making all those boring sermons bearable) yet never did anything about it. Karen will remain forever sweet 16 in my memory--although I suspect she now has grandchildren.

And so it goes. Why dwell on the failures and dead ends when the main narrative culminated in a happily ever after marriage that has managed to stand the test of time? I blame that first toddling temptress and the double iniquity I suffered at her hands! I stood in the corner for you! You embarrassed me at the modeling clay table!

I know, I know. It's time to let it go and wring my hands about something useful like global warming or the economy, but my Inner Child is still stuck in the corner.

Like some other men, I'm notoriously inept at processing the slings and arrows of love gone bad. Fortunately, I was saved by the love of a woman who has more patience than the saints and more sense than all the poets and their tormented bleats. She just puts up with me, which is the greatest love of all.

Still, much evil has been done in the name of love. Maybe, as science tells us, it's because the emotions reside not in the heart but in the lower reaches of the limbic system, the so-called lizard brain, and if you've ever tried to cuddle up to a crocodile, you know what lousy lovers lizards are.

If it's any consolation, we've evolved at least to the point where we bring flowers, which is unknown among the lower orders. And you don't see many crocodiles mooning about the little reptile with the big eyes that got away. They're crabby enough as it is.

It's a hopeful sign that evolution will take its course. So perhaps some day, say 100 million years from now, future generations will have moved on and Love will be a shared spiritual illumination among equal, consenting adults. Men, too.

Until then, there's lots of room left in the corner, or is that there are still lots of corners left in the room? Misery still seeks company...

Happy Valentine's Day