Raymond Carver is an interesting man, who lived an interesting life, who wrote an interesting short story called "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love." There are two couples at a house drinking gin while having a conversation. The main character, Nick, and his wife, Laura, seem to be ordinary people. Their friends, Mel and Terri, argue constantly and have two different opinions about love, but nonetheless claim they know they love each other. Mel and Terri are unarguably the most talkative, Nick and Laura just throwing in comments and asking questions from time to time. Mel and Terri both have former spouses that have left only dark memories. Mel gets aggravated when Terri claims that her former husband, Ed, loved her and that she will not be convinced otherwise. Mel argues that a crazy man like Ed, who physically abused Terri, could not have loved her. This was mentioned a few times throughout the story. As the story progresses, the conversation seems to get less and less meaningful and weirder, in my opinion. Mel starts to use profanity often. This is an effect caused by drunkenness. It seems that all four of the characters were drunk by the end of the story.
My thoughts on this story are still forming. Of course, I had a few initial thoughts as I was reading it. One of those thoughts was that Mel and Terri need to get their act together. Either they love each other or they don't, but it seems to me the disrespect they had for one another indicated there was no true love in that relationship (of course this being my opinion). I can picture that Nick and Laura give each other looks throughout the conversation as if to indicate that Mel and Terri are crazy. I am also trying to figure out the moral of the story, if there even is one. It would help me if I knew the purpose for which the story was written. I believe that if all four of these characters gave their hearts to Christ, that they would find a love more real and more true than they have ever known. After having found this love, then the couples could truly love their spouses.
I think the point of the story are the people themselves, and not a "morale" we can take from it.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I think the more meaningful part of this post is the second paragraph. Here's where you are raising questions and wrestling with meaning to some degree. Keep that up.