Okay guys,
For those of you reading to the first time, and for those returning to read this blog, I want to know what you think love means when it comes to marriage.
Sometime in my early preteens I heard a story about the languages of love. I cannot tell you all of them, nor can I tell you who told me the tale, but I can admit that it has shaped my view on "love". Some of the "languages" are touch, gifts, words, and time. I'm pretty sure that there are more, but oh well. I've always thought of love as an intense form of caring.  Love is when you care deeply for a specific person and want them to be happy. Sometimes this feeling is mixed with infatuation or desire, and we call that "love". The languages of love is a way that you convey those feelings. In my case gifts make me feel uncomfortable, words need to be used sparingly for me to believe them, time and touch are the ones that I really truly appreciate. I appreciate time because I know that everyone is busy and if you truly want to be with someone you will make the time. Touch is the best reassurance for me of another person's affection, but too much too hastily and I start to feel like an object.
The reason I ask this is because I've been focusing a lot of the theme of "love" in the play. I realized that my view of "love" is, while accurate for someone of my age and background, lacking. Here is a decent chunk on one of my essays that talks about love in a very concise way.

"A line in the prologue dates the play more vividly than the chronology of the program synopsis. There is no such thing as love, says an advanced daughter of the couple whose secrets are to be revealed- only a love-complex in the brain. But her aged mother presently sinks into a sleep sorely needed after weary weeks of watching at her husband's sick-bed; and, while she sleeps, her backward vision is unfolded, disclosing another truth of love" (Gorbin 17). Mary proves over and over again that the driving force in her life is the love she has and shares with John. Her children view her unfaltering devotion as an outdated, uneducated mistake. Lady Lessington even goes as far to blame everything on the times. "The fault of her generation, my dear. Women of her time simply didn't know how to manage life. When they married they gave themselves up body and soul to the man. Darling mummy! It was just the fault of her day" (Besier and Edginton 6). Many critics throughout the years will agree with Lady Lessington and assume that the play “…is devoted entirely to the theory that the best interests in the race depend upon a woman’s ability to respond with a prompt and cheerful 'yes' to each claim and demand made by one selected male person" (Broun). This assumption is absolutely not true. It is pointed out at almost every corner by almost every character that their love is a mistake, that everything will fall apart. It never does, but what works for John and Mary is something that every other character in the play may never understand or feel. The children, as well as many audience members, only see Mary being “slavish and subservient” (Besier and Edginton 6) to John, but what they do not see is that everything that John has done with his life, every choice and every success, has been for Mary. The young man pulled her away from a life of ease and comfort, with no promise of being able to give her the same. He does make a moving promise to Mary, “And, my love, I shall succeed for you, I swear it. One day you will be a wife of a big man. You shall be proud of me. You shan’t have a wish ungratified that money can buy. And never, never, my darling, shall you have a wish ungratified that love can buy” (Besier and Edginton 31). It is his devotion to her happiness is what motivates him and continuously drives him to become better, and he does eventually succeed. His success is what everyone sees of him, but what they do not know or see is the reason why. As per, the Victorian ideals that they were raised with, Mary and John are the surprising epitome of what a husband and wife were meant to be, they are truly devoted to one another’s happiness and, in their own way, take care of each other. John Carlton has many failings as a human being, but the love that he has for Mary is possibly his biggest virtue. When John cheats on Mary and they are faced with the awful truth of the situation, Mary “…shows the deeper meaning of the Victorian tradition, in the simplicity and strength of her fidelity” (Gorbin 17). She forgives him. Despite her jealousy and the shame that he has brought on the family, she forgives him because he needs her. They need each other. “Secrets is highly sentimental, but it is distinguished by its acute perceptions into the psychology of the two main characters" (Rollyson). Their lives are intertwined so deeply that it is hard for any outsider to truly understand the marriage, much like real life marriages are. It is this connection that helps make sense of the titling quote, “Every separate marriage is a separate mystery. Men and women come to doctors and they tell them secrets about marriage. But the innermost secrets they never tell. They couldn’t if they tried. For in every marriage there are secrets which only one man and one woman know” (Besier and Edginton 8).  Sometimes the husband and wife do not fully realize them except in rare moments (Gorbin 17). For Mary and John, their truth of their love is one of those many secrets between a couple that may never be fully understood. Secrets allows an audience in to experience the truth, but, more often than not, that truth is misinterpreted or missed altogether.

I feel very strongly about understanding the "why" behind an action or feeling. "Why" is the reason for everything and if we forget the "why" and the "how" and especially the "when" everything starts to loose it's perspective and we fall, once again, into the pit of apathy that is so common in my generation.