Falling in Love
某种意义上说，貌似你必然要爱上一个以前从未见过的人。当你认识某人时，若不是已经爱上了她的某些难以抗拒的倍具吸引力的与众不同，你又怎么知道自己心陷爱情？
"Some people say that they know right away, sell you love on a cloud for a lullaby." - The Bodeans
在你们没有遇到之前，你得知道自己喜欢什么、会爱上什么样的人。如果你不知道，当爱来临时你也什么都抓不住。
Read the companion article to this hub: Ever After: What Happens When You Finally Meet the Person You Fell in Love With)
浪漫的爱情之所以浪漫是基于一种设想，关于理想人选的设想——某个完善你的人，与你每次心跳与呼吸都自然匹配的人。某个与你迥异却与你完美互补的人。某个让你觉得自己是个完整的女人的人——如果你是女人；如果你是男人，则是某个让你觉得自己是个真男人的人。
In a certain way, it seems you have to fall in love with someone you'venever met. When you get to know someone, how can you know you're in love unless you've already come to love certain characteristics that you find irresistibly attractive?
你想要的是，你本身的填充，你身份的其他部分，以及那个感觉上去像你自己的心与魂一样的人。但你不可能知道这些，除非你脑子里已形成了那个概念并已经在追求它。当她/他一走进屋子你就知道了，你就知道因为你错不了。
You have to know what it is or who you would fall in love with before you meet. If you don't know that, you won't have whatever it is that will trigger the falling in love.
遇到特别的人
Romantic love is romantic because it's based on an idea. The idea of the ideal person - someone who completes you, someone who you feel naturally matches your heartbeat and your very breath. Someone who is very different from you but complements you perfectly. Someone who makes you feel entirely like a woman - if you're a woman, and someone who makes you feel like you're a true man if you're a man.
不过故事的另一面很可能让你的希望破灭。“某个人”是不存在的，除非已经存在了。换句话说，你爱上的那个人，得是现实中的人，你可以见到他或已经见过了，他务必是在你生活中真实存在的。
You want your completor, the rest of your identity, that person who feels like your own heart and soul to you. But you cannot know these things unless you have formed that ideal in your mind and have pursued it. Then s/he walks in the room - you just know, you just know because you can't go wrong.
我的意思是，你感觉爱上某部电影中从未谋面的影星好像是很容易的，但那不仅仅意味着毫无希望（因为你们可能从不会见面），也意味着极大的失望。当你“爱上”某个演员或是某个从未见面的人，实际上你对于“恋爱中是什么样一副状态”脑子里已经构成念想。
But the other side of the story might burst your bubble. There is no "someone" unless there IS. In other words, there has to be a real person, one you actually can or have met, one who is actually in your life to be the person you love.
爱情有时候令人惊讶。已经遇到、甚至已经认识好几年的人们，他们从未想过有可能，却最终坠入爱河。
What I mean is that it is easy to feel like you've fallen in love with the star of a movie you have never met, but that might not only be hopeless (since you may never meet), but also an enormous let down if you did. All you really do when you "fall in love" with an actor or person you haven't met is to shape the ideal of what it is to be in love.
这是怎么回事？在某种程度上说，是因为爱上某人是跟你的生活有关。真的，它不是跟你希望怎样却从未实现的生活有关。 而应该有关真实生活。
It can be amazing how love works some times. There are people who've met, known each other for years, and only truly fallen in love after they never thought that would be possible.
坠入情网没有必要是一种试验：如果不成功，你又可以尝试另一种来替换——它会是一种美妙的探索过程，与对的人相知、相融。
How does that happen? Well, in part, it's because falling in love is about your life. Truly - it shouldn't be about what you hope your life should be but never becomes, it should be about what really is.
但是这种结合也没有必要是什么浪漫的彩票游戏，可能带着火花和无穷尽的想法——你能够或许也应该和某人很长时间成为好朋友，可能甚至在你意识到什么是真正的性吸引力之前。
Falling in love doesn't have to be an experiment that if it doesn't work, you try an alternative - falling in love can be a wonderful process of finding, getting to know and bonding with the right person.
当然，你希望拥有强烈的性吸引力——毕竟，很难想象爱情中缺少了这个。不过，就算没有更深层的性感，你也当然可以在身体层面上有性吸引力。
But that bond doesn't have to be some romantic lottery game, with sparks and endless thoughts of what might be - you can and probably should be good friends with someone for a long time, maybe even before you realize the sexual attractionis what it really is.
网络交友
Of course, you want to have a tremendous sexual attraction - after all, it's hard to think of being in love without it. But you can definitely have the sexual attraction on a physical level, without having it on a much deeper level.
我曾一度尝试过网络交友，却最终发现不适合我。似乎对有些人管用。而在我，不像其他的情侣关系，我只在尝试了几个不同网站以后，就对其预期非常失望。
I tried online dating for awhile and found it was not for me. It seems to work out for some people, but unlike other relationships I've had, I was very disappointed in what the prospects were, after I tried dating through a few different online sites.
看起来好像是有许多女孩可以约见，而一旦见面，情况又大不同，让我总觉得之前在了解的是另外一个人。一旦跳出网络交友以平常方式约见，我就更多感觉是在结识真正的人，有他们各自的真实生活——不是浪漫故事或完美伴侣的构想。
There always seemed to be plenty of girls to meet, but once we met, the story was very different. I usually felt like I had been getting to know a different person. Once I got away from online dating and just met people in ordinary ways, I felt a lot more like I was getting to know real people, with real lives of their own - not a romance story or a fantasy idea of the perfect mate.
完美拍档
I have to admit there was a time when I became enamored of someone I met online - and we never met. She was overseas. I longed to read her messages as often as I could. I wanted to hear her voice and I wanted to know everything I could about her.
不得不承认我也曾经对网上某个人动心过——但我们没见面。她在国外。我渴望尽可能多地读到她的信息。我想听到她的声音，想知道我能知道的有关她的一切。
I dreamed about her - and the dreams were very vivid and seemed real. Sometimes I would wake up and go through much of the day thinking about my dream as if she had been with me the day before and left, and felt like I was missing her.
我还梦到她——梦里像真的一样。有时候我会醒来回想白天，再联想到我的梦境，好像她昨天和我在一起又离去了，感觉我很想念她。
I often thought I was communicating with my lifemate. Then when I moved from Georgia to Michigan, I took a month or two, as I told her I would, and got settled, before I started thinking about how we could finally actually meet each other and be together.
我总觉得我是在和我的人生伴侣交流。然后我从乔治亚搬到密歇根，我花了一两个月安顿下来，我跟她说过我会的，然后我开始思考我们怎样才能最终见面并且在一起。
I finally got back to writing her, but she wasn't there. Her emails bounced back. To this day, I'm not sure what happened. Did she meet someone else? Maybe. Did things change in her life in that time otherwise - I doubt if I'll ever know.
后来我还回去写过信给她，但她不在那里了。她的电子邮箱还退信。直到现在，我也不知道怎么回事。她是否去见了别人？或许吧。还是她的生活在那时有了变故？我怀疑我永远都不会知道了。
But the even more curious question is what if I had met? Then what? My later experiences taught me to think it might not have been everything I thought it would when we were just writing and talking. No, I can't be sure. But, you know, another thing is that all the things I thought I loved about her - I'm not sure I would be in love with that now - or that I ever really was.
不过，更好奇的问题是，如果见了面又怎样？然后呢？我后来的经验告诉我，很有可能不完全是我们当初聊的写的那么回事。是的，我不能确定。然而你懂的，另一方面我想的全是我喜欢她的那些事——我不确定我现在是否依旧——我想我曾经真的喜欢她。
There was something about the unattainability of our relationship that made it so intriguing. If I had met her at a fun event and got to know her, would she have seemed so special? Maybe, but not necessarily someone I would have fallen in love with. In fact, I think now the odds are pretty slim I would have ever fallen in love with her.
我们关系中的某些不可到达性导致了过程如此有诱惑力。如果我在一个娱乐场景遇见她、认识她，她看起来会这样独特吗？有可能是，但未必我会爱上她。事实上，现在我觉得爱上她的可能性是很少的。
Already Met, But Far Away
已经见过面，但是很遥远
Funny thing, though - to a guy, one of the most attractive things - at least when it comes to "falling in love", is a bit of unavailability.
可笑的是，尽管，对于一个男人来说，是最有吸引力的事情之一——至少一提到“坠入情网”，就有点儿不可到达性。
I don't mean that in the sense of playing games. I also don't mean it in the sense ofunattainability. But if someone is in another place, is making their own, independent life important - and is still charming, approachable and, at the right time, can be touched as well - that seems like the ideal circumstance for falling in love. But it's something quite different than the online type of relationship.
我并不是说玩游戏，也不是说不可到达性。而是，如果那个人在别的地方，以自己的独立生活为重，还仍然有魅力，可到达，在对的时间，也够得到——这都有点儿像谈恋爱的理想情况了。不过这跟网络约会模式有很大不同。
Can You Fall in Love with Someone You've Never Met?
你会爱上未曾见面的人吗？
Maybe it depends on what you mean by falling in love. For me, I'll take sight, touch, movement, etc. that comes with actually meeting someone, finding the real attraction, and letting the mystique of "getting to know" each other work its magic.
可能这个取决于你对爱情的定义。对于我来说，我会选择视线之内的，可接触到的，能一起行动的，等等，这样才是真实的与人约会，找到真正的吸引力，让“相互了解”展示它自己的魔力。
But I won't sell short the romantic idea of thinking about the ideal of that interesting stranger you've never actually met either. Surely off in the distance somewhere, at some time...don't you think?
但我也不会 卖 少 浪漫想法 Of 去想某个从没真正见过面的有趣的陌生人的完美模型。 当然在远处某个地方，某个时间……你不觉得吗？
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