Twitter @suzannelilly
He loves me, he loves me not. I'm ashamed to think of the countless daisies I destroyed as a girl wanting to know if my latest crush loved me back. How many flowers did you turn into no petaled nubs trying to find out if it was love?
There's a better way to discover if it's love that you're feeling. College students at Ohio State University have for decades been using an absolutely unscientific, totally romantic way to find out if they would share wedded bliss. It's a secret tradition not known by many outside Ohio or the hallowed halls of OSU.
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| Photo by Navin Rajagopalan on Flickr |
The beautiful campus has an oval green space with trees and walkways that rival any park setting. Through the center of the Oval, as it's called, is a long brick walkway, aptly named The Long Walk. It begins on the west side at the statue of William Oxley Thompson and stretches eastward, ending at a seal in the walkway. Lovers walk the path, hand in hand. If they can make it from one end to the other, with their hands still clasped, they kiss at the seal. Their commitment is sealed with a kiss. (Bad pun, I know.)
That doesn't seem too hard, does it? If living and loving together for the rest of our lives is that easy, we should all be so lucky. It seems reasonable to think that if a couple can't make a walk across campus holding hands, it's hard to imagine them walking through life together.
Mariah Davis, the heroine in Shades of the Future, had grandparents who made the walk and lived many blissful years together. But she may find the walk is too much for her to handle, even though she loves Kevin Creamer more than anything. Mariah has sunglasses that help her see into the future, but they're not showing if she'll ever get to make the Long Walk with Kevin. She can only hope he'll still be there for her when she's ready again.
How do you feel about things like this? Do you think they're old superstitions or do you think they ring true?
What a lovely story, and such a pretty picture! Old superstitions like that are romantic, but why could they not be true? Of course, perhaps when this tradition started, divorce was just not done?
ReplyDeleteI'm sure it started way back when divorce was taboo. I think things like this are fun to do, just to say we did.
ReplyDeleteWhat a cool thing to find for your novel! I think I'd be a big believer while still in the early flush of a new love, but now I'm an old married lady and maybe I don't read enough Romance. LOL!
ReplyDeleteHaving said all that, while in France my husband said it's supposed to be good luck to kiss under the Eiffel Tower so we made sure to. And up at the top, just in case.