“This is the way of lovers, isn’t it - to overqualify their experience? Who, in the midst of rush and longing, thinks, well, this love is mundane, inconsequential, and utterly unoriginal?

No. To those in the midst of falling, all love is great love. It would be insulting to suggest otherwise.

But still, at the risk of appearing biased or overly sentimental, might I suggest that even in the truth of this, some loves are different. And this was one of them.

It is commonly accepted that a love affair is only made great by time and history and by its discovery and retelling at a time long after the love has ended, by death or leaving. Hearts broken by distance or cruelty or the ultimate fallibility of the human heart. We believe that the greatness of a love affair can only be defined and named in retrospect—after it has been documented, proven, recognized by many.

But normal rules of love do not apply here, because this was not an ordinary love.”