This weekend, a friend and I went to see The Time Traveler's Wife. This is one of my all time favorite books, and I was very excited to see the movie. I thought that it was a good adaptation too.However, it really got me thinking about the concept of soulmates. When I was a teenager, I used to really think that there was only one person for everyone. It was like two fallen stars trying to reconnect. Once you found this other half of yourself, everything in life would be blissfully happy. As I've grown up, I've realized just how foolish this idea really is.
Yes, I do believe in love, but I no longer think that being in love will solve all problems. Just because you love someone does not mean that you will not have problems down the road. Relationships are constant work and both halves of the couple need to be willing to commit to working continually on a relationship.
I also do not believe that if the person you love dies that you should live the rest of your life alone. The person left behind is still alive and should be able to love again.
This is not what happens in The Time Traveler's Wife. In the book, Clare spends the last 40-50 years of her life waiting for her time traveling husband - her soulmate - to visit her. He's been dead for 40-50 years, but she hopes that in the past, he had traveled into the future and had visited her during this time (you kind of have to read the book to fully get this part). She knows that it happens because he has visited their daughter after his death.
However, Henry does not come to Clare until she is near death. She has wasted half of her life waiting for him. During this time, she was in limbo - unable to move on or to love again.
I find this incredibly sad. But, I think when I was a teenager, I would have found it extremely romantic. As an adult, I'm a realistic enough to recognize that living in limbo is a half life. I still love this book, but I'm glad it's fiction. I hope that the real Clare would have been able to find someone new to love while still loving the memory of her dead husband.
This angers a lot of readers that she's sitting around waiting for him, but I always felt that was her choice. She did know him longer than most soul mates so she had decades on others. I don't even think Clare had the option of falling in love with anybody else even if she wanted to.
ReplyDeleteI never believed in soulmates. I believe there are good matches, but I definitely don't believe in one person for everybody.
Also, as much as being in love is work, it shouldn't be as much work as some people make it out to be or you should only be putting in as much as what you get out of it. In that sense, Clare always seemed to get the shaft. She basically has to support herself and wait. I think it works out at least that Alba can control her travel.
Did you see Rachel McAdams on The Daily Show? She gives away most of the movie and Jon Stewart was teasing her. My DVR cut off the end so hopefully I can catch a replay online.
When I was younger, I always liked the romantic stories where a couple ends up together, but I always liked the couples to work for their happy ending either through internal or external struggle versus a lot of fairy tales where things fall into place because then I wonder if they'll be happily ever after. If you work very hard before your happy ending, you can get through anything.
It didn't make me angry it just made me sad. It was her choice, but I think it was the wrong one. However she is a fictional character so I shouldn't get too concerned. If she was real, I would need to host an intervention. :)
ReplyDeleteThe book remains one of my absolute favorites though. I'll need to reread it now that we saw the movie.