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Growing up as an imaginative child I was, as many of you have been, treated to the fantastical notions of many mythological creatures that, for me, were as real as the nose on my face. Just because I had never seen them didn't mean that they did not exist. Even now, in my early forties I am convinced of the existence of Santa Clause- though that is an existential notion for another discussion. The Easter bunny, though, is just silly.

Unicorns, Dragons, Wizards, Witches, Vampires, Romantic Love- the list is almost endless. But it is the notion of Romantic Love that I want to tackle, because it is the one that has cost me the most.

The idealist in me, the one that persists in thinking of the notion of Santa as a real character, wants desperately to hang on the belief that romantic love is real. But the realist in me, the one that grows stronger with each passing day, is coming to the conclusion that love really is, as many psychologists believe, a compendium of needs.

You meet someone that you find attractive and it turns out the attraction is mutual, and sexual tension grows. A relationship is pursued and as you go along you find that the other person fulfills list of needs in your life- be they physiological, psychological, or most likely both- and you feel the love grow. You pursue the path that you have been brought up believing you need to pursue, one could even say indoctrinated or programmed to pursue and you coast blissfully through life with your true love.

What happens if your needs change? What happens when they change? And what happens when the other person is not equipped to help you fulfill your new set of needs (or even recognize that particular phenomenom is occurring) as you grow and mature? Does Love die? Was it ever really there?

I have never met anyone who came to that point in their life where their needs mature in different directions at the same time, have the perception to recognize that, and are able to either adapt or lay it down with grace. Someone always ends up wondering what the heck happened. Someone always gets hurt.

I am becoming convinced that the people who end up happy together until the day they die constantly fulfill each others needs. The needs dont change or they are able to adapt and learn as they go along. Lucky them.

What hurts the most, I think, is that we are raised and indoctrinated with the notion that there is someone out there for everyone, and all we need to do is find that person and further, that there is a realistic expectation that you will find that person.

It happens, Im sure, but I am no longer convinced that it will ever happen for me.

Dont get me wrong. Its not that I dont believe in Love. Maybe if it were not for my cousins, whom I would die for it if it came to that, I might be completely jaded to the idea of Love. Its just that mythological beastie, Romantic Love, in which I find myself losing faith.