BURT: Do you promise to let our daughter be fat or skinny or any weight at all? Because we want her to be happy, no matter what. Being obsessed with weight is just too cliché for our daughter.

VERONA: Yes, I do. Do you promise, when she talks, you'll listen? Like, really listen, especially when she's scared? And that her fights will be your fights?

BURT: I do. And do you promise that if I die some embarrassing and boring death that you're gonna tell our daughter that her father was killed by Russian soldiers in this intense hand-to-hand combat in an attempt to save the lives of 850 Chechnyan orphans?

VERONA: I do. Chechnyan orphans. I do. I do.

WHY DONT WE SEE THESE COUPLES ON TV? OR IN MOST MOVIES? OR EVEN IN MANY BOOKS?

PROBABLY BECAUSE THEY ARE RARE.

AS RARE IN REAL LIFE AS THEY ARE IN WORKS OF FICTION.

AND THIS ISNT AT ALL GOING TO BE A MAN, JOHN KRASINSKI IS SUCH A DREAMBOAT; I WISH HE WAS MY BF!

BECAUSE THATS JUST TOO CLICHÉ, FOR THIS DAUGHTER.

IT IS

HOWEVER

A LAMENT

OF SORTS.

THE IMAGES THAT WE SEE

OF LOVE

AND LONG-TERM COMPANIONSHIP

ARE RIFE

WITH ALL KINDS OF

CRAZY CRAZY CRAZY CRAZY CRAZY.

AND WE ARE TAUGHT THAT

LOVE IS

HOLDING A BOOMBOX BLASTING PETER GABRIEL OVER YOUR HEAD

OR BONING WHOOPI GOLDBERG

BECAUSE THE GHOST OF PATRICK SWAYZE

IS INSIDE OF HER…

!!!

SEE? ALL KINDS OF CRAY-ZAY.

AND EVEN WHEN I KNOW BETTER,

BECAUSE I HAD THE WARMEST GENTLEST MOST BEAUTIFUL EXAMPLE

OF LOVE

AND LONG-TERM COMPANIONSHIP

IN THE HOMES IN WHICH I GREW UP,

I AM ALSO REMINDED ON THE DAILY

THAT LOVE IS

WITH THE FOCUS SO LARGELY ON ALL OF THE

CRAZY

AS IF THE CRAZY WAS PROOF

OF REAL LOVE.

WHERE ARE THE MAYA RUDOLPH WOMEN THAT KNOW WHO THEY ARE AND WONT MARRY JOHN KRASINSKI WHEN HES HAVING A CRAZY SPELL BECAUSE SHE KNOWS WHAT SHE BELIEVES?

OR THE JOHN KRASINSKI MEN THAT GO DOWN ON THEIR GIRLFRIENDS ENOUGH TO KNOW WHEN THEY TASTE DIFFERENT?

OR THE MAYA RUDOLPH WOMEN THAT ARE MATURE ENOUGH NOT TO JUDGE THEIR PARTNERS WHEN THEY CODE- SWITCH WHILE TALKING TO THEIR BOSS?

OR THE JOHN KRASINSKI MEN THAT WILL CALL THEIR PARTNERS CUNTSUCKERS LOUDLY ON A CROWDED TRAIN? (TO GET THE BABYS HEART RATE UP, DUH…ITS REALLY A SWEET SCENE.)

OR THE COUPLES THAT HAVE MUCH MORE TO THEM

THAN THE LOVE THEYRE IN.

SEE? ALL KINDS OF CRAZY.

AND IM NOT TRYING TO DENY THAT THE CRAZY EXISTS,

BECAUSE IT SURELY HAS ITS PLACE

IN LOVE AND LONG-TERM COMPANIONSHIPS

BUT MY FRUSTRATION LIES IN THE FACT THAT WE FOCUS SO MUCH ON THESE EMOTIONAL HIGHS AND LOWS, WITH IMAGES OF THE CRAZY BOMBARDING OUR EYES AND HEADS AND HEARTS,

THAT WE FORGET THAT WHEN WE ARE IN LOVE

REAL LOVE,

WE FEEL ENOUGH SECURITY IN OURSELVES AND OUR PARTNERS THAT WE DONT NEED TO FOCUS ON THE LOVE THAT WE ARE IN,

JUST AS WHEN WE ARE IN GOOD HEALTH WE DONT NEED TO FOCUS SO MUCH ON

BREATHING IN

BREATHING OUT

BECAUSE IT IS NATURAL, SECOND-NATURE, A PART OF US.

AND THOUGH BREATHING IS VITAL,

WHEN WE ARE IN GOOD HEALTH,

WE FOCUS ON OTHER THINGS AND WE CAN DO THOSE THINGS BETTER,

BECAUSE WE ARENT PREOCCUPIED WITH OUR BREATHING.

AND MAYBE IF WE SHIFTED OUR FOCUS IN OUR WORKS OF FICTION

OUR DAUGHTERS AND SONS

WOULD BE LESS

CLICHÉ.