Love: Resume' or Passion?

Lately I've been thinking a lot about love. Okay, so maybe it's not such a lately kind of thought, but a new situation has made me consider a few things about the dynamics of love.

Here's the question: Are you looking for someone who fits the resume' of what you're looking for, or would you happily cross all those expectations off your list if you found someone who showered you with limitless love, someone who completed you.

Put another way, would you rather marry someone you were reasonably happy with who could provide every earthly desire you ever dreamed, someone who had all the education and experience you expected out of a mate, someone who had a job you were proud of, -or- would you gladly trade in the hopes for the four bedroom, picket fence house and summers at Hilton Head for someone who was able to keep that fire burning at home. Someone whom you couldn't wait to see when you woke up, someone you were so glad to kiss goodnight.

I have long operated on the premise that if any of the following applied to you, I wasn't interested:
no college degree
non-Catholic
divorced or with kids
not well traveled
not interested in the arts
unemployed
not good at cooking

Yeah, I know. Tough crowd. Lately though, all my qualifications have got me thinking: maybe that's why I can't find someone. Perhaps I'm looking for a needle in a haystack. Maybe I've set the bar so high that I'm failing to notice anyone I make a connection with.

Because when it all boils down, I could really give a hill of beans whether I have the white picket fence and the Volvo station wagon in the years ahead. I'm not saying I don't care whether I have kids or not, or a happy family life for that matter. What I'm saying is this: I don't think that all the bells and whistles of life really make a difference where love's involved.

Sure, I could ix-nay my desires for true love to spend all eternity with someone attached to a fat cat checking account.

I could someday be the young wife for a 40 something re-tread who wants to try family life over again. I could give up a career I love to be a stay-at-home wife for a man who wants to pay the bills and have a loving family to come home to, waiting in the kitchen with dinner on the table. I could bat around town in some German car with a big rock on my left hand, checking out the boutique du jour, thanks to a man I would loathe kissing.

But would I really be happy?

Or, I could say goodbye to all those preconceived notions, all those trumped up expectations and just wait and see what my heart leads me to. Maybe it would be a teacher or an artist who would charm the pants off me. Maybe I would fall madly in love with someone who sorts Fed-Ex boxes for a living. Maybe I belong with someone who's never seen the inside of a Catholic church. Who knows. I'm starting to think maybe I shouldn't disregard a man just because he doesn't fit my cookie-cutter mold of the ideal mate.

That doesn't mean I'm opening up my dance card carte blanche for just anyone. I guess what I'm saying is, I'm going to pay more attention to the person rather than the resume', because what it boils down to is this: the flesh will always be there, whereas any charming quality could be vaporized off paper in a New York Minute.

I just want to find that person who makes my heart skip a beat... that man who I want to dedicate my life to making happy... the man who I want to sit in rocking chairs with when I'm in my 70s, staring into the sunset in South Carolina.

Who cares whether its a rental or a second home. As long as he's there, it'll be golden.