Urgency in Romance
I was watching an old chick flick over the weekend and I had a realization.
It's a trite trope at this point for there to be a disagreement and then for one character to be leaving at the airport and another character to make a last minute decision, blitz to the airport, profess love at the gate, and convince them not to leave.
I used to just look at this and say, "how unrealistic" and almost wish life was so simple.
What I've overlooked however is that the reason that shows up so often in these movies is that its extremely realistic - so much so that it's an archetype.
If there's a moment of conflict or indecision the best way to resolve that is dramatic action either that you do or that life does:
- Moving
- Moving on (i.e. dating or marrying someone else)
- Something life threatening like a natural disaster
So if I could relive being single and I wanted to move things along I think I should have just manually taken one of these actions. Moved or moved on.