thought for the day

I have to drive back and forth several times to UTown before classes actually start.  Pay the bill, go to the bookstore (although I ended up ordering everything used from Amazon), meet with my advisor, and (tomorrow) go to an orientation session.  Once classes start I'll probably be so stressed while I'm driving I'll want to listen to music, or I'll be so behind I'll need to listen to whatever of my reading assignments I can find on audible, but at the moment, it's still summer vacation for me.  So I decided I was in the mood to try another of the In Death books, which is the sci-fi murder mystery series written by Nora Roberts under the pen name J.D. Robb.  I listened to several of them while driving last summer, and the narrator, Susan Ericksen, is excellent. The series is about a detective named Eve Dallas who solves murders while being romanced by her fantasy gazillionaire husband Roarke.  They're an engaging pair who have great arguments, even if they are totally over the top at times.  And there are assorted enjoyable side characters, like Eve's assistant Peabody (the only voice the narrator misses, although I've gotten used to the way she does it now).  I gave up on the series a year ago-- I was completely hooked on the first four, but the fifth and sixth were a little less interesting, and the seventh was a bomb.  I don't remember the details, but I remember at one point Eve was interviewing a witness as if the victim was the prime suspect.  It was silly.  So I decided that--like every series I've ever read that didn't have a defined story arc over a set number of books--it wasn't worth pursuing past the first few.

But for some reason this week I was in the mood for Eve and Roarke, so I downloaded the next one and so far it's exactly what I wanted.  I'm less than halfway through, so we'll see.  But so far, so good.  One thing that just makes me roll my eyes, though:  Robb/Roberts uses the word "cop" as if it describes a religious vocation.  You kind of wish you could have a dollar for every time she says something to the effect of, "She was a cop, but she was a good cop," because you'd end up with a nice little pile of cash by the end of the book.  But I digress.

All of that to say......... good lord, it takes me a long time to get to the point........ and the point is a complete non sequitur, so get ready to change gears--  It occurred to me while I was listening to it on the treadmill this morning, what if the characters of a romance novel all express aspects of a single person?  sort of like when you're dreaming, you can interpret all the characters of your dream as expressing different pieces of yourself.  So the hero would express your (or the author's) inner masculine self, and the heroine would be the inner beloved-- a term I'm borrowing from what I remember of Jean Huston's book, The Search for the Beloved, which I read years ago.  (If I had ever formally studied Jung, I would throw in something here about the hero being the animus, because it would be really interesting, but I'm not sure I know what I'm talking about.)  And the story of the two of them coming together would mirror someone working out the interior balance between their masculine and feminine selves.

The whole idea of the inner beloved fascinates me.  It's not the same thing as the Inner Child, although I suppose there are some similarities.  You know that feeling you get when your creative self lines up with your goals for yourself and what you're doing in the world, and everything is humming along, full of joy and vibrancy and rightness?  That's what I think of as being in tune with your Inner Beloved (and it's been so long since I read the book that I'm not even sure that's what she was talking about anymore, but that's what I remember).  The times when I've felt this connection in my life weren't necessarily easy times.  Often there were stressful or difficult things going on at the same time.  But in hindsight, the thing I remember is that feeling of vibrancy, of being truly alive, and of being in touch with something within myself that felt like the gooey chocolate cherry center.  If you know what I mean.

Think about it the next time you read a romance novel.