Changes...

I have a lot going on online and I realized that I really need to figure out a clear purpose behind each of my online endeavors. To that end, this blog - formerly known as "A Healing Love" - is hereby renamed "Romance Junkie." Once again I'm gonna mention borednow... I'm starting to realize what a huge influence she is on me. LOL! Well she is my best internet friend. I decided to focus this blog on shipping and romance of all kinds and a lightbulb went on above my head. What does borednow call herself?! I wanted to rename this blog and I knew that her nickname for herself in regards to shipping (favoring certain relationships) would be the perfect title. So I asked her what her nickname was.

...

She calls herself a romance wh*re. Is that a bad word? I'll bleep it out anyway.

I ... haven't earned that title but I thought about my addiction to cookies and decided that I'm more of a romance junkie. I'm certainly addicted but... yeah.

I'm going to talk about Chimmy (The relationship on Smallville between Chloe Sullivan and Jimmy Olsen) again tonight though.



My love for Chimmy has grown and by that I mean changed but not lessened or increased. In the course of writing a Chimmy essay, I realized that Chimmy isn't just a healing love as I originally thought. Not that Chimmy as a healing love would have been bad. I do think that Chloe has grown in positive ways as a result of being in a relationship with Jimmy AND I think that Chloe's heart did heal a great deal while she was with Jimmy. I think, looking back on Chloe and Jimmy's relationship, that it's more complicated than that. It's not just about what Jimmy has done for Chloe. Over the course of their relationship it certainly became something Chloe fought for as well. Chloe/Jimmy is A Sorta Fairytale.

"It was almost love. It was almost always." It was glorious and they had hopes for forever and those hopes were dashed. Alas and goodbye.

I have a new ship!

Gareth and Lynette from Arthurian Legend.



I'm reading Tennyson's Idylls of the King about Arthurian Legend. When I first started reading about Gareth and Lynette, I didn't quite know what to make of them.

You can read the section about them for yourself - HERE

I liked Gareth. He was determined to become a soldier but his mother, the Queen, couldn't bear to have him go. Finally after he makes a great argument to her about how unseemly it is for him to stay by his mother's side well into his manhood, she lets him go... on one condition. That he not tell anyone his name and work in Arthur's court as a kitchen boy. For a crown prince this is... very humbling to say the least. Humiliating. His mother was sure that he won't do it. But he did! Cheerfully. It made me love him more.

So he entered King Arthur's court as a kitchen boy. Sir Lancelot really liked him but Sir Kay hated him. Kay was horrible to him and gave him more work than the other kitchen boys etc. Gareth worked hard and cheerfully despite his true identity and Sir Kay's cruelty. (I think T.H. White used a little of Gareth for Arthur's back story. Maybe not. I don't know much about Arthurian Legend in all of its forms.) After awhile, just as Arthur and Lancelot uncovered Gareth's true identity, Lynette entered Arthur's castle. She needed a knight - preferably Lancelot - to slay three errant (evil) knights who were holding her sister Lyonors under house arrest until she married one of them. Arthur sent "the kitchen knave" to save the day. Lynette was horrified and insulted that the King would take the threat to her kingdom so lightly as to send a kitchen boy to deal with it.

I was shocked by the way Lynette boldly expressed her displeasure. She rode off without Gareth and when he followed, she turned on him and insulted him. She said he stunk of the kitchen and that there was no way he would be able to defeat the knights. After he defeated the first knight I was sure that she would give some sign of gratitude or something! NO. She said that for a moment she couldn't smell the kitchen but when the wind picked up he stunk as badly as ever. Lynette insulted him again and again. Gareth was long suffering, kind and gentlemanly in the face of her horrible words. She seemed like such a snob. I thought about Buttercup from Princess Bride. But Lynette was not as dumb as Buttercup and I didn't think she was flirting.

Lynette ranted and railed at Gareth the entire trip to her castle. He's not a noble. He should turn back now. Insult after insult. Scorn, scorn, scorn. I started to hate her. I thought of Lois Lane on Smallville (and in general) and the way she banters with Clark. I felt that I was getting - in the person of Lynette - insight into why some people hate Lois Lane. I saw a stuck up, rude woman insulting a heroic guy because she's mistaken his true identity. There was no humor in it. It wasn't sexy. Gareth vanquished the second guy... Lynette ranted. Third guy... Lynette ranted... and then I realized. She loves him.

I'm not sure when it happened (it'll be fun to read again and find out exactly when) but if Lynette really hated Gareth as much as her words expressed, she would have just shut up and waited to be proven right. I realized Lynette was trying to get Gareth to leave so he would not be killed. <3 style="text-align: left;">
The horrible insults that Lynette hurled at Gareth really made a nice contrast to her change of heart. I'm going to have to go back and read again to find the exact moment of transition. But during the last fight, Lynette cheered for Gareth. When Gareth won, she payed him a kingly compliment in a very humble way. She didn't know that he was noble, she didn't know anything more than that he was a kitchen knave. I started drawing hearts in my book.

I talked to borednow about my tentative new ship and it turns out she's dead gone on them! She sent me a link to "The Savage Damsel and the Dwarf." At the link there was an excerpt from the book. I read the first couple of chapters. From the little I read it expands on the story and combines it with another story about Gawain.

The expanded version by Gerald Morris does not end with Gareth marrying Lynette. I suppose Tennyson diverted from Sir Thomas Malory when he had Gareth marry her. Ah well. I haven't read Le Morte De Arthur yet - though I own it, so I cannot comment of Beaumains and Lyonours.

For now - Gareth and Lynette FOREVER!