I remember when I first listened to Caroline’s version of “Everything Is Romantic.” I was sitting next to Margo in her Fiat after coming home from a homemade pasta squash dinner. We had about thirty minutes on a dark Connecticut highway left to speed down, and we went through the Brat Remix album. I know it’s overdone. But stay with me.
I was overwhelmed from the moment I heard “fall.” I sat in mild shock until it was over, attempting to process why I started to gently cry after hearing a goddamn Charli XCX song. I turned to Gogo and laughed at myself, but she didn’t bat an eye. Instead, she said so earnestly, “it makes sense you are emotional. It’s an emotional song. It’s hard to reflect on how everything we do in life is romantic, and why we put ourselves through it again and again.” Finally an artist had explicitly put to words this cyclical nature - everything we do is in pursuit of romance.
As time passed and people absorbed and then moved on from the Brat Remix, I found myself constantly returning to not only the song, but the idea of romance. How its essence permeates every single aspect of my seemingly uneventful life, manifesting in not just significant relationships, but also my daily routines and choices.
Everything is romantic.
Is everything romantic?
People grow up, we go to school, we graduate, we get a job, we get a house, we fall in love, we have a family. These are the pedestrian stepping stones of how we are socialized to “succeed” in life. But what about the in-between parts? What about why we read a book, or why we decide to splurge on Friday night takeout, or even why we get dressed every day?
Every morning at school, I get out of bed, brush my teeth and hair, and tend to curate more of an outfit, rather than staying in pajamas in the name of comfort. Sometimes I meet myself in the middle. For example, today I put on a weathered vintage Stanford hoodie and a dark wash pair of denim. Breaking down these seemingly paltry acts expose the ways in which everything we do has deeper emotional currents, whether it be the need for comfort, pleasure, or simply the desire to be seen.
What we know is that humans need food, water, and shelter to live. But for what?
For romance.
So let's break it down. In the morning, I put on clothes and accessories that make me feel like myself. This outfit is then digested by those around me, who make assumptions about who I am based on what I wear. In doing so, I will graduate with not only a degree, but a sense of self both internally and imposed upon by others. This sense of self guides me into deciding what career I would like. I then get a job that I hopefully enjoy to sustain myself. The job leads to a house so that I can have space and eventually move in with someone - start a partnered life and possibly a family. The New York Times wrote, “bonding and mating are essential for the survival of the [human] species,” and while I might be falling into the slippery slope of generalizations, I did in fact just prove that even a pair of jeans and a hoodie are in pursuit of romance.
Unfortunately for Bell Hooks, "living simply makes loving simple” doesn’t ring true for a materialist &toster with a mild-to-severe shopping addiction. Think about when you see something online, whether it is a mock neck embroidered top or a final sale pant from Nº6 Store. You constantly look at it and try to justify spending a pretty penny on your materialist habits when no holidays or birthdays are coming up. Enter phase one: obsession. According to experts, in early stages of love, cortisol rises and serotonin depletes, meaning obsessive thoughts - whether they be anxieties or hopes - overwhelm the brain. This shirt, shoe, or bag kicks in your OCD tendencies and even infiltrates your dreams. Just like when you have a crush for the first time, and you are unsure if that person likes you back or is just messing around, and all you can do is obsess over every text they send, replay every line they briefly spoke, or overthink any prolonged eye contact made during the day.
So you get whatever item of clothing it is you are slowly falling in love with, and once you finally style it with the perfect outfit, it feels like an adrenaline rush straight to the head. You want to wear it every single second, because you are quite literally in love with it. The power of your new gift acts as a drug, creating a sense of euphoria every time your hands trace its contours. Love feels so good, according to experts, as the science behind the sensation of love mimics the euphoria associated with the use of drugs like cocaine or alcohol. Just like sitting across from someone at a bar when it is pouring outside, leaning forward and giggling for no reason. Like holding someone’s hand in public for the first time, or finding the perfect placement for your head to fit into the nook of their neck as you mold into each other for a hug. Like being in love in upstate New York.
The months fly by, and you are in the honeymoon phase, wearing your new coat, pair of glasses, or band tee everyday. But suddenly two years have passed, and you haven’t touched the piece since. Something you once cherished is a mere afterthought, with the promise and excitement of new clothing overshadowing the old. You look back at photos and think “wow, that was so ugly. How could I have ever worn that??” When we engage in romantic love, the neural pathways responsible for critical assessments shuts down. Love, quite literally, is blind.
This is a cyclical tale as old as time. We want something so, so bad. We get it. We love it. We hate it. We forget about it. And while the old love is coming to a close, a new order is just around the corner, waiting for the similar romance to follow suit. We crave this cycle of shopping like we crave love, or drugs.
So Caroline and Charli were right: everything is romantic. We fall in love, again and again, even with clothing. In the midst of heartbreaks, whether it be fashion or partnership, it is hard to ever find yourself permitting love back into your life. Why would I spend so much money on something that will hurt my bank account and then be seen as a mistake in a few years? Why would we fall in love if the pain of something ending feels neverending. Insurmountable, even.
Ultimately, we have no choice. Sorry! Romance is infused into everything we do, scientifically and in faux-&tost philosophy. It’s tragicomic, really, yet there is something profoundly beautiful about the love affair inherent with life itself - the endless cycle of yearning, acquiring, and one day moving forward, only to restart the process again and again. I’m exhausted even writing my silly little blog post about this constant human impulse to be in pursuit of something, only to let it slip away. But this tension exposes the essence, so to speak, of life itself. Maybe this very act of chasing after something, be it clothes, money, intelligence, or love, is what gives us purpose. For after all, everything is romantic.
