The idea of growing old together is a thing of terrible beauty.
Wonderful for the irreplaceable history, the memories, the time. Cruel because it has to end. There must be a goodbye. Made all the more horrible precisely because of that same history. Those memories.
All of that time.
Why then would anyone choose this? A fate that is sure to end in misery! But also a life that is greater than the eventual pain.
Is it that same inevitability that pushes us together? Are we wired to seek out those things that come at the greatest cost? Are we unavoidably drawn to that kind of value?
Of course we are.
It is the same force that compels us to explore. To greed. To create. We must expand. We look for patterns. For others like us. The one that challenges us to be more. The force that pushes us to expand. So we do. And we must. Even though we know it hurts us in the end.
Because the alternative is to be crushed immediately. To live with the weight of what we could have been. To regret that we are not who we should be.
So we gladly accept the price of that bargain. The inevitability of it all.