It seemed a marvel to her that any mortal should suffer for lack of love, and yet she had never known a mortal who didn't feel unloved. There was enough love just in this ugly hallway, she thought, that no one should ever feel the lack of it again. She peered at the parents, imagining their hearts like machines, manufacturing surfeit upon surfeit of love for their children, and then wondered how something could be so awesome and so utterly powerless.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on the abundant love present in the world, contrasting with human feelings of unworthiness and lack of love.
In this quote, Chris Adrian explores the paradox of love; despite the overwhelming capacity for love that exists within parents for their children, individuals still experience feelings of being unloved. The imagery of parents as machines producing endless love highlights the reality that even in abundance, love may not reach or be felt by those who need it most, emphasizing the complexity and often helpless nature of emotional connections.
In practice
A speaker discussing emotional well-being at a community center.
We are here to love, not to judge. I'd been blaming and raging. I certainly wasn't loving my daughter that afternoon as God loves me. God's love doesn't insist on perfection or even good common sense. Why then should I demand more of those I love? With this tiny change in perspective I began to see the need for correction wasn't in my daughter, but in me.
Everything we do is either an act of love or a cry for help.
Love and nonattachment are the basis of true generosity.
She poured out Swann's tea, inquired "Lemon or cream?" and, on his answering "Cream, please," said to him with a laugh: "A cloud!" And as he pronounced it excellent, "You see, I know just how you like it." This tea had indeed seemed to Swann, just as it seemed to her; something precious, and love has such a need to find some justification for itself, some guarantee of duration, in pleasures which without it would have no existence and must cease with its passing.
But, drawn to her at that moment, he felt a quiet like the voice of the rain flow over him. He knew well enough that for her it was in fact no waste of effort, but somehow the final determination that it was had the effect of distilling and purifying the woman's existence.
Love is the veil between lover and lover.
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