What are your thoughts on non-traditional romance?
When one thinks of romance, they might think of late-night drives with their partner, four-hour conversations, ice cream at a mall, or cuddling under the bedsheets. If the honeymoon phase is over, they might think of going home from work to see their loved one, waking up to them cooking a sweet omelet, or - if they chose to procreate - teaching their children the ABCs.
But beyond the conventional depiction of romantic love - beyond how romance is imagined in the movies or conceived in the minds of the majority - there is a niche but burgeoning sub-genre, if you will, of the commonsense term: non-traditional romance.
'All romance is non-traditional', one may say. And to this I respond, 'I agree with you. No individual can compete with the love you have for your partner. Romance is a sacred and ineffable experience for both sides. It is something that can only be understood when one strips away intellectual understanding and makes way for the more visceral, emotional parts of their psyche. When it is an experience so subjective, it is fundamentally impossible to formalize and systematize it into a neat little box.'
But even if we argue that romance is different from subjective experience to subjective experience, it is also true that this does not prohibit the mass majority from categorizing in their minds - and perhaps it is an unconscious categorization - an invisible Overton window or line of gradient between what we consider traditional and non-traditional romance.
Where traditional romance houses unspoken rules like monogamy or a relatively stable power balance, non-traditional romance might be more fluid and flexible - or more rigid and logical - in their approach to satisfying the collective psyche of both partners.
While not all of non-traditional romance, a common example is BDSM: Bondage & Discipline, Dominance & Submission, Sadism & Masochism. There is also romance without romance, breaking free from the typical notion of the word 'romance' itself and turning the relationship into a spontaneous, unpredictable canvas in which we paint the colors of self-expression. There is also polygamy. There is what the spiritualists may call a 'tantric relationship'. There is the Harley and Joker relationship - folie à deux, or shared madness.
Romance is subjective and has no rules. What matters is the satisfaction and consent of both parties. One romance may value loyalty as a virtue. The other may view it as a burden and prefer multiple partners instead. One may think termination conditions reduces the relationship to mere business transactions. Another may think the very nature of formalizing relationships is in and of itself attractive or kinky, or perhaps they prefer stability and order in a world of chaotic emotions.
What are your thoughts on non-traditional romance? Would you ever have one?