Emily Roberts was a self-proclaimed sucker for love. At the tender age of seventeen she had already been in love twice, however, both of these gentlemen had taken the first chance they had in escaping from her constricting reins of possessiveness. Both seemed to move on rather quickly which resulted in Emily’s consumption of endless pints of ice cream per week, an excessive amount of weeping, and numerous accounts in which Emily’s best friends, who were forced to listen to her exaggerative testimonies, were the real victims. To their dismay she was currently involved in her third run in with “true love,” John, and it was gag worthy to all but herself. She walked down the hallway clung to his arm and looked at him in the same way a lion hunts down his prey. The glimmer in her eyes was the same shine that brightened up a fat kids face as he looked at chocolate cake. She never unlocked her wide eyes from his left cheek as they continued walking, making the situation all the more creepy as he refused to mutually look back at her. Emily was not a sucker for love, she was simply too obsessed with the idea of it. She mistakenly replaced true passion for the childish greed of infatuation and found comfortable relief in being totally absorbed by a relationship. She needed someone to be there at all times-to fill the emptiness-which showed the ultimate sign of weakness.

Annie Phillips, on the other hand, was an eighty-six year old woman who still spoke to her husband in the same sarcastic way that she did sixty-six years ago. Annie had never been the flamboyant, over-emotional type and she hardly spoke of the contents of her marriage. She felt as if she shared her fondness of her husband with the world that it would not just escape from her mouth, but from her heart and she was immensely fond of him in a way that was not understood by many. She adored him through a severe case of PTSD after Vietnam, through a multitude of divorce threats, and even when the love he had for her was seeming to fade. Her admiration was not a choice nor could she banish it with vengeful remarks or tons of ice cream. It was infinite and unceasing.

The discrepancy between a woman who is infatuated and a woman who admires is simply that of a woman who needs to be loved and one who doesn’t. Immaturity is of course to blame for the incessant amount of puppy love that exists all around us, but confidence and respect, however, can be gained in the sandbox, giving the inexperience excuse absolutely no credibility. There is a significant gap between being distracted by youthful indifference from one’s faults and being naturally immune to them due to the power of true admiration, and to be buried beneath the weight of foolish obsession is to put one’s self respect up for grabs, while unreserved idolatry is admirable in itself.

The absurdity of infatuation can be traced back thousands of ages. The word stems from the Latin word infatuare meaning to make a fool of. Meanwhile admiration derives from admiratio- meaning to wonder at. The two words seem to be relatives in the origin department. The adjective of “infatuated” will mistakingly be affiliated with a person in love more often than not, but when reading wedding vows one would think being wonderfully delighted by their companions’ characteristics is much more attractive than being foolishly dumbfounded by the same.

However, there are a multitude of scenarios that commonly annihilate the wall of separation between the two words. We cannot help but wonder if Annie is just the grown-up and matured version of Emily, or if when loving someone, no one cares if you admire them or if you are obsessed with them. Both actions have the ability to create some sort of satisfaction, and after all, isn’t that what a relationship is meant to do? In today’s society, our expectations are grand. The actions that we demand of our significant other seem to be more important than being content with the person that we are asking the endless tasks of, and the actual depth of their character. In a world of text messages instead of phone calls and social network posts instead of legitimate devotions, the word love gets lost in translation resulting in the unknowing that there is even a contrast between the words infatuation and admiration.

The blur between the two is impossible to ever fully erase, but the words continue to stand forcefully on their own- defining two types of women and men. There are those whom will learn to like a person by refusing to deal with their dirty laundry, and there are those who will hand wash all of it in the sink. The prideful and the selfish are the people who establish affection for only those who adore them in return, while respect is given to those whose affections are not consumed by impacting realities. The Emily’s of the world will kick down an ugly sandcastle, while the Annie’s will build a second floor.