On the Face of It

Cycles of Romance

The  Gateway Arch at St. Louis is an imposing structure … and represents an experience in the viewer … that's possibly translated in many ways. Arches have often been engaged to represent … gateways … in the way of suggesting an entrance … into something beyond. Damascus was built with 8 gates … each representing a specific direction … to its environment … in respect of the city. The Arc de Triomphe … in Paris … is at the center of 13 different roads from the city … as it redirects traffic from one direction to another.

An artist on the Champs Elysees … sitting with a canvas and brush … would probably capture thousands of moods … of the Arc … depending on the seasons … cloud conditions … sunlight … night … a drizzle … people … cars … the sky … and so forth. Each frame would of course contain the one Arc de Triomphe … but feature it in so many conditions … as if to appear like so many different personalities all together.

The Indic is fond of representing … the forms of their deities … inside an arch … between the two pillars …. and the arch above. In this … we come to encounter the suggestion … that what man experiences as duality … and monotheism … is brought together in a union … by an arch. The Egyptians represented something similar with the Ankh … that's designed as a cross with an oval shape on top.

A translation of this experience … is probably best made by someone who relates to it in his experiences. For me … it points to two souls … that journey as eternal friends throughout creation. Each undertakes a specialization in a part of the work of progeny. Thereafter they bring that into relation with each other … and attempt a reunion … to express the sense of a common purpose. Such a friendship … it appears represents separately the male and female … mind and the passions.

I have been grappling with a certain aspect of this relationship that has bewildered me for years. I'm putting it down on paper today … with the hope that bringing it into expression … would help to create new perspectives around it … no matter how incredulous it may seem. The main difference is in the content of experience. The passions rely on the eros natures … and they are related to the formation of bodies … and the reproduction process. The mind engages the eros as a reflection of the work of the passions … and cultivates an expression of that work … in song and in words.

In essence therefore … both the mind and passion based experiences of life are entirely capable of surviving by themselves. They each represent a scope and dimension of experience that is different from the other … but in coming together … they create the possibilities … for a shared sensation … that enhances the quality of life. We find such a union primarily in the human experience … not in anima … or plants. Its a critical aspect of our lives … and represents itself as the arch … that links the two pillars … of the gender differentiated human body.

As a man engaged in the study of the phenomenon … a person comes to reflect on his experience of the study … and is able to differentiate … the techniques from the content. In a mind based approach … he views the work of the passions … as the scheme of activity … that guides him to the content of his understanding. Such schemes evolve … from the simple … to the very complex. It moves from the passion to the reasoning of the mind … and then back again to the passions … and thereafter the cycle continues … refining both the passions and the mind.

From a long list of such cycles … I managed to minimize to the significant points … to create a visual impression of the experience. This commences with the face of the male … that is made contact with by the passions of the female … in part 1. In the responses created by the female … the male comes to adopt a certain scheme … of perceptions regarding his personality and self. This is part 2. Thereafter … the responses of the male seeks to affirm his understanding with the female … and this is responded to by the female … to indicate her understanding of his communication … on the issues. That's part 3.

Beyond this … the communication between the two of them … is the arch of their relationship … and it serves to affirm them in the union. This brings up the curious factor of the face … in step 1. What accounts for the way the female … responded to the male … in the first place? Here's where I came to the tentative conclusion that the female … functions on a different experience of the universe … as compared to the man. Hence my growing impression that the arch between a male and a female … may well represent the experience of two separate universes.

To borrow from the ladies … I'm going to attempt a reading of the face myself. On the face of it … it appears that the Europeans rely on an arch of union … that creates 13 cycles in their relationship. The Arabs … 8 cycles … and the Indic who professes his love by the Taj Mahal … 4 cycles. The Americans obviously rely on only one. As an expression of the arch of union … it represents a view of all the factors … that come into play between couples … making love … an experience that is simple … or very romantically complex. On the face of it anyway ...