5.2. LOVE AND OTHER PROBLEMS

5.2. LOVE AND OTHER PROBLEMS

5.2.1

Preparation

Do you believe in love at first sight? Give

your reasons.

Vocabulary

Read the story. Underline the multi-word verbs

and idiomatic expressions. Then discuss their

meaning with your partner.

Across a crowded room

It was love at first sight. I saw her standing on the other side of a crowded room sipping a glass of wine. Our eyes met. I walked over to her and said, ‘You seem to be on your own. Can I join you?’

She smiled and said yes. At first she came across as rather shy, but as I got to know her better I found out she was an open and confident person who was easy to get on with. At the end of the party I said I would like to see her again and asked her out for a meal the following week.

I took her out to a small Italian restaurant in Soho. After talking for a while, we found out that we had a lot in common – in fact, we seemed to have the same interests and tastes in everything. She smiled at me when I spoke to her, and when our eyes met this time I knew that I was head over heels in love with her. I thought that she was falling in love with me, too. We started going out with each other, and after some time we got engaged and decided to live together. We were both very happy and made plans to settle down and get married the following year.

However, it wasn’t long before things started to go wrong. She seemed less affectionate and loving as the weeks passed, and I started to feel she was going off me. She criticized me all the time. ‘Why are you always going on at me?’ I asked.

In the end I wondered if we were suited to one another. I was keen on hard rock and she was fond of classical music. I was interested in sport and she was interested in politics. We finally fell out over a TV programme. We had a terrible row, broke off our engagement, and called off the wedding. A week later she moved out. I was heartbroken, and it took me a long time to get over it.

A few months later I heard she was engaged to a man who worked in local government. They got married, but after two years their marriage broke up and they got divorced.

I tell you this because last night I went to a party and I was drowning my sorrows when I saw her standing on the other side of the room sipping a glass of wine. I saw a man walk over to her and heard him say, ‘You seem to be on your own. Can I join you?’

Definition

Match the verbs with their definitions.

1. to come across as something

a. to stop liking someone (informal)

2. to ask someone out somewhere

b. to start to live a stable, regular life in

one place (perhaps after buying a

house or getting married)

3. to go out with someone

c. to give the impression of having a

particular characteristic

4. to settle down

d. to cancel something (an arrangement or event)

5. to go off someone

e. to discontinue something, to bring

something to an abrupt end

6. to go on at someone

f. to spend time with someone socially,

often to have a romantic relationship

7. to fall out (with someone)

(over something)

g. to come to an end

8. to break something off

h. to have an argument with someone

and stop being friendly with them

9. to call something off

i. to keep complaining about something to someone

10. to break up

j. to invite someone to go out somewhere

(to a restaurant or theatre)

Drills

Listen and respond to the prompts.

5.2.2

Rephrase

Jane is very upset. Her friend, Mary, has come to

visit her. Look at their conversation below.

Replace the words in italics with multi-word

verbs.

MARY: What’s the matter, Jane? Have you had an argument with Paul again?

JANE: Yes, you could say that …

MARY: Well, it takes two to have an argument. What was it about this time?

JANE: He said I was always complaining and criticizing him.

MARY: Is it true?

JANE: Well, in a way, yes. But I was feeling insecure because I thought he was starting to dislike me.

MARY: How long have you been seeing one another?

JANE: Nearly a year now. But yesterday I discovered he’s been having a relationship with someone else.

MARY: Oh, so what did you do?

JANE: I told him, and he said he wanted to end our relationship.

MARY: But I thought you were planning to get married in June?

JANE: We’ve cancelled it.

MARY: Well, I’m sorry to hear the two of you have ended your relationship.

JANE: I think it’ll take me a long time to recover from this.

MARY: Well, perhaps it’s for the best. You were never really happy with him. And after all, there are plenty more fish in the sea!

Listening

Listen to the dialogue to check your answers.

What does the last sentence of the dialogue mean?

Why does Mary say it? How would you express the

same idea in Russian?

5.2.3

Correction

There are six mistakes in the text below.

Find and correct them.

I used to be very keen at football, but I lost interest in it when I met my best friend’s sister. At first I was only fond on her, but later on I fell in love to her. We had a lot on common and thought about getting married. I was engaged with her for six months, but in the end she got married with someone else.

Off

The particle off can be used with some verbs to give

the idea of stopping or cancelling something:

e.g. They broke off their engagement and called off

the wedding.

Complete the following sentences with multi-word

verbs that use the particle off.

Can you _____ all the lights when you go to bed, please?
Hello, operator, I was talking to someone and we were _____. Can you try to re-connect us, please?
There isn’t time to have the meeting today, so we will have to _____ till next week.
It’s been lovely talking to you on the phone, but I must _____ because there’s someone at the front door. I’ll call you again next week. Bye.
I wish they would make up their minds one way or the other. Yesterday they said the wedding was on, but now they’ve had another argument and say the wedding _____.

C What is the difference between the following:

to break something off and to break up?
to put something off and to call something off?
to call something off and to break something off?

5.2.4

Meaning

Match the beginnings of the numbered sentences

below with the endings on the right. Write the

complete sentences out using appropriate

punctuation.

1. She’s always flirting with other men	a. but they’ve never actually hit each other.
2. He adores his wife	b. so he asked her out to dinner.
3. They became acquainted	c. it’s just infatuation, really.
4. They have terrible rows	d. and she’s very fond of him.
5. He was really attracted to her	e. but she’s too shy to ask him out.
6. I don’t think his love for her will last very long	f. although they quarrel quite often.
7. I don’t think she’s trying to seduce him	g. when they no longer respect each other.
8. It’s surprising that they go on living together	h. it’s just that she’s a very affectionate person.
9. They’re quite close to each other, really	i. so he often gets jealous.
10. She really fancies him	j. at a mutual friend’s birthday party.

B In the following, put the words in the correct order.

a. Martin and I / and / met at a party / each other / for / immediately / fell

b. You / that pretty waitress / saw / chatting / on Friday night / at Bilbo’s Restaurant / I / up

c. ‘Get / you /with / how / on / do / Bill?’ ‘Very well.’

d. Darling, I can’t bear you to be angry with me. Make / can / up / it / we? Can we let bygones be bygones?

5.2.5

Activate

Put the following parts of the dialogue in the right

order (the first one is in the right place). Add the

missing words.

BRAD: Hi! I haven’t seen you here before. Can I get you a drink?

TINA: No, I think I’d rather just dance … You dance pretty well …

BRAD: Listen, Tina. I’m sorry about the other night. Can we make a fresh ____?

TINA: Oh, Brad. I’ve missed you so much …

BRAD: I’ve behaved like a fool. Can we let ______ be bygones?

TINA: Oh, Brad …

BRAD: Who was that on the phone?

TINA: Oh, it was only Dave.

BRAD: What, your _____ flame again? Can’t he take a ____?

TINA: He was just asking if we wanted to …

BRAD: I’m sick of this. Why don’t you go out with your precious Dave tonight? I’m leaving!

TINA: But Brad … !

VICAR: Do you, Tina Leonora Smith, take Bradley Desmond Brown to be your lawful wedded husband, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, from this time forward, till death do you part?

TINA: I do …

TINA: Kiss me, Brad. Tell me that you’ll never leave me.

BRAD: How can I leave you? I loved you from the moment I ____ eyes on you.

TINA: Me too. Love at first _____, don’t they say?

BRAD: Who’s that guy you were talking to? He couldn’t _____ his eyes off you.

TINA: Oh, that was Dave. Would you believe it, I used to be crazy ____ him.

BRAD: Well, he still seems to fancy you.

TINA: Don’t be so jealous, Brad. He’s just immature…and a bit ___ sick still, maybe.

Metaphor

and Idiom

Match the expressions in italics in the dialogue with

their definitions below.

a. very much in love with

b. forget about the past

c. felt unhappy because you weren’t there

d. a previous girl / boyfriend

e. from the first time I saw you

5.2.6

Listening

Listen to the song and fill up the gaps in the verses.

Sylvia’s mother

Sylvia’s mother says,

‘Sylvia’s busy, ____busy __ ____ to the phone.’

Sylvia’s mother says,

‘Sylvia’s _____ to start a new life of her own.’

Sylvia’s mother says,

‘Sylvia’s _____, so why don’t you _____ her _____?’

And the operator says,

‘Forty cents more for the next three minutes.’

‘Please, Mrs Avery, I just _____ talk to her,

I’ll only keep her awhile.

Please, Mrs Avery, I just _____ tell her goodbye.’

Sylvia’s mother says,

‘______ _____, she’s _____ be leavin’ today.’

Sylvia’s mother says,

‘______ _____ a fella down Galveston way.’

Sylvia’s mother says,

‘Please don’t say nothin’ to make her start _____ and stay.’

And the operator says,

‘Forty cents more for the next three minutes.’

‘Please, Mrs Avery, I _____ _____ talk to her,

I’ll only keep her _____.

Please, Mrs Avery, I _____ _____ tell her goodbye.’

Sylvia’s mother says,

‘_____ _____, _____ _____ the 9 o’clock train.’

Sylvia’s mother says,

‘Take your umbrella ‘cos, Sylvie, it’s _____ to rain.’

And Sylvia’s mother says,

‘Thank you for callin’, and sir, won’t you _____ _____ _____?’

And the operator says,

‘Forty cents more for the next three minutes.’

Interaction

Answer the following questions:

Why does the boy want to talk to Sylvia? Can you say how he feels?
Why does Sylvia refuse to talk to him, in your opinion?
Is Sylvia’s mother for or against their relationship? Why?
Do you think the girl loves the young man?
What advice would you give to the heroes of this story?

5.2.7

Discussion

Read the text, make up the list of ideas expressed

in it, and give your attitude to them. Use the words

in bold.

Where is love?

A search for love of any kind may lead, oddly enough, to disappointments and personal disasters. What is the danger in looking for love? Can love be found at all?

We are forever looking for love in our lives. We look for a sweetheart who will turn into a loving spouse. We look for love from our parents and respect from our children. We look for love from our government, hoping the leaders will be compassionate with us and countrymen. But strangely, we often get into our worst messes when all we are doing is looking for love. A marriage may split up due to one of the partner’s looking elsewhere for love. A teenager may wreck his car and his body by driving too fast in a quest for a certain kind of love from his peers. Desperate for love people ruin their minds with drugs, which give them a temporary surge of a counterfeit feeling similar to love. Does anyone ever find love? If so, where is it? Observation suggests that love, real as it is, cannot be found and isn’t anywhere. When you go looking for it, you are going to find something else. What you find may keep you occupied for a while, even addicted, but it’s not love. Love is the most priceless treasure that life affords us. Religions enshrine it, billboards exploit it, professors categorize it, and newspapers report on its perversions. But it is nowhere to be found. Love is a song that threads its way through our lives from beginning to end, but could you ever try to find a song?

Love and songs must and do express themselves using time and space, but they can be neither found nor captured in time and space. If no one were looking for love, our world would be in sad shape, some might say. But our world already is in sad shape precisely because so many people are on this quest, which seems so laudable and reasonable until you examine the results of it. The problem with looking for love is that it is the me that wants it. The me wants love in the form of pleasure, money, status, fame, and any number of other terms. And if the me wants these things badly enough, the me will get them. Unfortunately, all the me gets is the forms and not the love. The me grabs for the beautiful flame and gets only hot ashes. Love eludes the me always, because the me is somewhere, and love is nowhere – they can never meet. Is there no way, then, to find love? Is there no solution to this dilemma? Probably not. However, it is a simple fact that anyone can love. It is one of our inalienable rights as humans to love and to give.

Self-forgetfulness is recommended by most religions as a way to peace and enlightments. Knowing this, spiritual aspirants try to forget themselves, hoping peace and enlightment will come. Catch number one here is that they cannot forget that they are forgetting themselves so they are still caught in the me. There is no catch number two. When we grow weary of looking for love and finding only its ashes and its forms, we may suddenly give up the search. When we have been bitten by our greed and have had our very health impaired by our search for love we stop our hurried quest one day and look within – not within the me, but within the cracks of the universe. We may not see anything, but we feel something – we hear a song. we feel a change in ourselves, a new perspective from nowhere. We haven’t asked for it. we just stop searching and there it is.

That is love, sneaking into our lives from the cracks between the betweens. We were never away from love, and could never find it. Love may catch you anywhere. You live within love always, but you can never find it, capture it, preserve it, or explain it – you might as well try to build a rose with a hammer and nails. Just wait, and listen, and watch, and work – and one day when the time is right, a rose appears on the bush. This rose is rooted in the cracks of the universe, and so is love, and so are you.

5.2.8

Translation

Give a literary translation for the following passage.

What are Louise’s views on love and marriage?

- You don’t think it’s a bit … a bit obsessive? – Miriam asked cautiously. – I mean, how you are about him? You don’t think you are a kind of typical mistress waiting and waiting while he fobs you off with excuses?

Louise closed her mouth on an angry retort. - We are going at my speed, - she said. – I didn’t want more commitment at the early stages. It’s only just now that I feel ready to move on…

- You’re not truly free if you’re not free to fall in love.

- Fall in love! – Louise mocked. – ‘Melt and flame and flutter’?

- Not melting or flaming then – but you know what I mean. Intimacy, openness.

Louise shook her sleek head. – I believe in comradeship and sexual compatibility. All the rest is just a patriarchal myth to keep women in their place, waiting for men, putting up with their neglect or abuse.

5.2.9

Speaking

Express your views on how people should behave if

they want their relationship to be successful. What

makes some relationships break up? What qualities

do you think are needed for a lasting relationship?

5.2.10

Writing

Look at how the time expressions below are used to

sequence the events in the story ‘Across a crowded

room’.

Using these time expressions, as well as the multi-

word-verbs and idioms, you have learnt in this

unit, write a description of either:

* a romantic play, book, or film that you know (possibly using the ideas from part B) or

* the development of a romantic relationship.

B The sentences below are the beginnings or ends of

paragraphs on the back covers of (imaginary)

romantic novels. Choose one of them and complete

the story.

Eternally Yours …

Susanna was taken completely by surprise when she accidentally opened a letter to her husband that began ‘Darling’ and ended ‘Eternally yours’ …

Escape to my Arms

… Racing barefoot through the forest with the dogs getting closer and closer, Diana fell straight into the arms of a tall, dark stranger.

Heart to Heart

Roger’s illness meant either an early death or an early transplant. Given the choice, he didn’t hesitate, but he had never met a heart surgeon quite like April Davies before …

Pasadena Passion

Her heart was racing as she drove the Chevrolet into the motel parking lot.