Saturday, May 12, 2012

Why I stopped Reading Romance Novels



I can’t remember when I started reading romance novel. All I can remember was the moment I’ve seen the sweet world of romance novel, my days of mystery adventure with Nancy Drew and my days of hide and seek with the Sweet Valley Twin were gone. It was replaced by mushy afternoon date and romantic dinner with candle lights with every gorgeous guy in every story.
I became addicted to it in an instant I cannot put it down until I finished reading it. I can still remember my brother in law, when he was still courting my sister, gave me a box full of romance pocket books and paper backs. Don’t you know that I finished reading those novels within a few days? I didn’t stop until my eyes turned red and became a zombie due to lack of sleep. That’s how crazy I was over romance stories.
I read everything from cheapest to the priceless, from local to international, from fly by night stories to bestseller, from modern day romance to Anglo-Saxon love stories and from paperback to hardcover. I even became a member of all Pocketbooks and Comics renting shop in our town and of course I was their no. 1 borrower.
It took me years of reading to get familiar with the writing style of local and world renowned writers. Without looking the book’s cover I can easily determine who wrote it through the author’s writing style. That’s how enthusiast, I think, I am. Years of reading taught me which is worth reading and worth buying, needless to say that I have a collection that was worth a large amount of money.
I was so hopeless romantic that I believe one day, like a heroine in those stories, I will meet my soul mate, my destiny, and he will sweep me off my feet, and we will fall in love and we will live happily ever after. That was when I started to become a day dreamer. Weaving my dream that hoping someday it would come true.
Until one night, I was in masquerade ball, like in Venice during the Renaissance era, there was indeed a lavish dance, with everyone hiding behind masks, lots of sparkle and feathers, people were dressed in wonderful costumes and the song speaks of trying to figure out who’s behind the masks. Then suddenly instead of Prince Charming, Reality took my hand and danced with me in a waltz of life. Instead of sweet nothings, Reality whispered in my ears about the hard truth of life. Reality showed me how cruel the world can be and even kissed me with the bitter taste of it.

Time to wake up my Princess… and Reality left me in a cold dark place.
I woke up and realized that I was lost in the midst of the beautiful stories in my shelves. I was a fool to believe in the perfect world and a promise of happy ending. My eyes were so blurred to see the thin line between fiction and reality.
My off limits and untouchable priceless collection that once have a special corner in my room was now lock up somewhere in our storage room together with my hopes and dreams and foolishness.
Life is more dramatic and complicated than a novel. No twist, no surprises, no rewind, no happy ending, no summary, no prologue and epilogue just full of obstacles and challenges one after another that you have to overcome and it goes bigger and bigger as you grow older.
Reality killed a side of me, a naive and idealistic princess who believed of wonderful world of happy ending, and of fairytale, Reality left me with:
Faded hopes and shattered dreams,
Unkept promises and bitter memories,
Empty smiles and hollow laughter
And a broken heart that never stop loving.

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