Through [my friends] I discovered what it was to love people. There was an art to it...which was not really all that different from the love that is necessary in the making of art. It required the effort of always seeing them for themselves and not as I wished them to be.
Interpretation
The quote reflects how love involves recognizing and appreciating people as they truly are, akin to the process of creating art.
Lucy Grealy emphasizes the deep connection between love and artistry, suggesting that both require an appreciation for authenticity. To truly love someone, one must see them for who they are, rather than trying to mold them into an idealized version of themselves, just as an artist must capture their subject's true essence.
In practice
This quote can be shared during a friendship celebration to highlight the importance of genuine love.
I spent five years of my life being treated for cancer, but since then I've spent fifteen years being treated for nothing other than looking different from everyone else. It was the pain from that, from feeling ugly, that I always viewed as the great tragedy of my life. The fact that I had cancer seemed minor in comparison.
When I tried to imagine being beautiful, I could only imagine living without the perpetual fear of being alone, without the great burden of isolation, which is what feeling ugly felt like.
I treated despair in terms of hierarchy: if there was a more important pain in the world, it meant my own was negated. I thought I simply had to accept the fact that I was ugly, and that to feel despair about it was simply wrong.
.. if you asked most people whether they believed in love or not, they’d probably say they didn’t. Yet that’s not necessarily what they truly think. It’s just the way they defend themselves against what they want. They believe in it, but pretend they don’t until they’re allowed to. Most people would throw away all their cynicism if they could. The majority just never gets the chance.
And as we stray further from love, we multiply the words. Had we remained together we could have become a silence.
If I never see you again I will always carry you inside outside on my fingertips and at brain edges and in centers centers of what I am of what remains.
It means much to have loved, to have been happy, to have laid my hand on the living Garden, even for a day.
Women are like tricks by sleight of hand, Which, to admire, we should not understand
Oh, hasten not this loving act, Rapture where self and not-self meet: My life has been the awaiting you, Your footfall was my own heart's beat.
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