He looks out of the window and sees two people holding hands in the street.
Oh, love! His girlfriend just dumped him, and the last thing he needs is to be reminded of sweet love!
He swiftly closes the curtain, turns on the television and stares at Tom Hanks professing his love to Meg Ryan in Sleepless in Seattle.
He changes the channel furiously, skipping past Four Weddings and a Funeral, Pretty Women and When Harry met Sally.
Impossible!
He goes to the nature channel and sees some bird doing an elaborate mating dance.
He turns on the radio and listens with teary eyes to the lyrics of “Let’s Do It” by Cole Porter.
“And that’s why birds do it, bees do it
Even educated fleas do it
Let’s do it, let’s fall in love.”
He gives up and stares at the television while the song plays . . .
Truly, falling in love is one of the most natural things in this love-crazed world.
On the telly flamingos parade en masse while displaying their necks and swivelling their beaks, greater sage-grouses strut competitively and pop their yellow neck sacs (really loudly) and hooded seals blow red air sacs from their heart-shaped nostrils.
Porter continues: “Romantic sponges, they say, do it, oysters down in Oyster Bay do it . . . Electric eels, I might add, do it, though it shocks ‘em I know. Why ask if shad do it? Waiter, bring me shad roe!”
He has no idea who this “Shad” is and why he’s rowing, but it must be something to do with love.
“No more,” he cries.
He sees blue-footed marine birds hop from side to side to show off their spectacular blue feet and Japanese cranes leap, bow and flap their wings in a hauntingly beautiful courtship dance.
“I’m sure giraffes on the sly do it, even eagles as they fly do it. Let’s do it, let’s fall in love.”
He summons energy from unknown reserves and peeks through the curtain again.
Two birds sit perched high on a roof, close together, one head resting securely against the other’s neck, behind them a heart-shaped cloud drifts in front of a romantic sunset.
“In Spain, the best upper sets do it, Lithuanians and Letts do it. Let’s do it, let’s fall in love.”
OK, OK! He picks up his phone and thinks of Alain de Botton’s quote: “Awareness of the insanity of love has never saved anyone from the disease.”
He will send his ex one last message pleading forgiveness.
Just before he sends the message his phone beeps . . . A message from her!
“Look out of the window at the heart-shaped cloud,” she exclaims, before adding, “I was a little rash. Will you forgive me?”
He smiles from ear-to-ear, glad to be loved once more! Love isn’t fleeting after all!
He didn’t notice the heart-shaped cloud has shifted and the doves flew away.
He switches off the television before a programme on shark attacks.
It only matters what one thinks, as Shakespeare said: “Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.”
