“E is even more than anyone that you adore can.”
E is our last letter for this four part series on L.O.V.E.
E this week is for everlasting euphoria.
I’ve always associated sexuality with euphoria, but after much research I found euphoria means more than that. It’s a state of over elation, either a sexual or the exhilaration one gets when one achieves something great. It’s also a mental and emotional state of being.
I don’t know if I’ve felt euphoric. I like to think I have when I was in love: I always had butterflies, always smiled and will immortalize our first kiss forever.
But, I also have felt euphoric when my show choir won nationals in Chicago my senior year after a tough competition season, and when I traveled Greece—I’ve never loved a place more or felt more comfortable.
I’m not quite sure when we can each define when we’ve felt this, but I hope that we all can one day. I hope we find an elation that means something to each of us, a memory or person we can adore.
Euphoria can also create mania and an exaggerated state of well being. I guess like when 14 year old girls see the Jonas Brothers or when Derek Jeter comes to visit and the girls swoon and Yankee’s fans line up to snap pictures and twitter about it for weeks.
Now everlasting is the tricky part. We try our hardest to sustain relationships with loved ones, friends and family, but it always takes two to tango.
I know that my bonds with my sorority sisters will be everlasting, as will the love I have for my family and pizza lunchables (they are one of my guilty pleasures).
But I’m not sure that my love for things like Kate Spade purses (another one of my guilty pleasures) and Bravo TV shows like The Real Housewives of Atlanta (guilty) will last forever.
Yes those are frivolous things, I will admit that, but will they give me anything in the end? Most likely not, but for now they fill a temporary desire.
How do we then achieve everlasting euphoria?
I say that we need to once again surround ourselves with people who really love us. I know I stress this just about weekly, but I mean it. No one should waste their time with petty drama and people who don’t truly care for them.
I have a great group of friends, but then I also have a close group of amazing friends, who are there for me through everything.
Just a week ago I stormed in crying after being stressed by multiple things going on and my roommate sat in the late hours of the night listening to all my woes.
Now I know most of my sisters and friends would do that, but I knew she was there not of obligation, but because she was genuinely concerned for me.
The friendship I have with her will be everlasting, and I know it will be one filled with great elation.
Most of my friends are starting to find themselves in the same predicament that I am in—what are we going to do after graduation in May?
I hope whatever path we all take whether its stay in Tampa, go back home, work to save money or work someplace we love, it’s a path that will bring us everlasting euphoria.
With such little time here at UT and most of us a quarter of the way done with our lives, we have to start thinking about what we want, where do we want to be and who do we want to be with?
Either way I truly hope that each of you finds love and everlasting euphoria for someone, someplace or even something.
Heather Gromley can be reached at hgromley@ut.edu.
Before this comment starts, one grammar correction: “…whether its stay in Tampa, go back home…” It’s. Please don’t forget your apostrophes.
Everlasting euphoria… it’s an interesting concept. In principle, you’d think, “Gee, who WOULDN’T want to be happy all the time?!” Upon further examination, however, unrelenting happiness, the cessation of feeling pain; I think it’d take away the importance of some of the things worthy of our euphoria. In fact, if you were an everlasting euphoric, clinical psychologists would diagnose you with Bipolar I disorder.
That being said, I enjoyed how you made it real– it’s not just about our love lives, but about what we love, and what will ultimately make us happy in life after graduation.
To close, you mentioned Yankees fans going ga-ga for Jeter… Well, Red Sox fans go crazy just for the game. It’s a lifelong relationship, just like with your sorority sisters. Even there, though, fans like Fever Pitch’s Ben Wrightman admit it’s not everything. After all, “You love the Red Sox, but have they ever loved you back?”