A letter to those who ridicule young love

A woman once mockingly said to me “aw do you love hiiiiim?” in that whiny, patronising voice that we all know too well, that voice that doesn’t have the desired effect of making us laugh or smile, but stare back blankly with our lips pursed, not quite meeting their eye because it would be rude to disrespect our elders - as much as we might want to.  The bitter questions fight to jump off of our tongues “since when did my age dispose of my capability to love? Do you really think that I am stupid enough to be unaware of the depth and complexity of the emotion just because of the number of years involuntarily attached to my identity?” because the truth is, it hurts when we are discredited and it hurts when we are looked down upon by bitter, old women who - in reality - are desperate for the freedom of young love once again because they’re stuck with bitter, old men who are probably bigoted, racist and never leave their arm chair in their strictly M&S living rooms. “Do you really think it’s easy to be conscious of the fact that one day I am going to have to abandon the person I am in love with to do ‘greater things’ and leave with my heart screaming in my chest desperate to cling on to perhaps my one chance of true love?” It would be wrong and pathetic in their eyes to stay with the one person who makes me happy because that would be wasting a life on someone who doesn’t even care, I could go on to do better things… so inevitably one day we will end. And it’s going to hurt. A lot.  Someone once told me to be careful what you wish for and God I wish I had been; there’s so much pain in loving the perfect person when I know eventually life will tear us into our separate directions and neither of us will want to say the word ‘good bye’ so we will just half-heartedly cling to that last thread of hope, that isn’t even really there, and my heart will tear with us.  Why did I ever resign myself to this constant reminder that my happiness can only bring me pain? “So don’t tell me that my love is less real and less significant than yours just because of a number; my love is more passionate, more exciting, more meaningful, more solid, more calm, more shocking, more emotive than you would even believe because you only see what you want to see through your 10% off glasses from bloody specsavers. Your view of the world is decrepit, just like you.”