divit45-blog

[lakeofsilverpike]

I am not over the ramifications of aging up Moiraine and Siuan. The idea that they are a couple who were together for decades before the prophecy forced them into the world’s most challenging long distance relationship really does make sense. They maintain a commitment to each other even with little hope of being together in this life because they know each other so intimately and completely. If they’re in their 80s, that means they probably spent from the time they were teenagers to the time they were in their 60s together.

Not just in love from afar but navigating an actual day to day life together. Two women from such different cultures and classes and families, navigating those differences, loving each other for who they are and where they come from and the life they’ve chosen. Think of the actual real difficult conversations to learn each other, to understand each other, to build a life together.

It just makes it so much more poignant. They aren’t two people who fell in love as children then dreamed of a life together but never had it. They are two people who were essentially married for fifty years before the prophecy. They knew each other in and out when they parted. The pufferfish temper. Who snores. Who steals the blankets. Insecurities. And fears. And all the fights. The stupid fights. But also the big ones. The ones where you say hurtful things but work through it together. And decades of making up after. Decades of deciding against having a fight anyway. Just an “ok pufferfish” and a laugh. Because why fight if they can skip to the makeup sex?

Fifty years is ample time to see the bad in a partner. The insecurities that you soothe at first but later get so tired of. Fifty years is enough for people to grow apart, for passion to fade. Enough for a partner to see all of you, including your very worst, your most cruel, your most afraid, your most defensive. But seeing all that, Moiraine and Siuan still loved each other so much that they never gave a second thought to whether they would stay together even when physically apart.

Fifty years together and they still wanted each day together so desperately that it breaks their hearts to be apart. That there was never a question of whether they would still return to each other in this life if given the opportunity. This Moiraine and Siuan aren’t dreaming of being together in their next lives because they never had this one. They are dreaming of it because they had this life together, and the best thing they could possibly imagine is more time. More time together. In this life or in the next. Any way they can be together. Stolen moments or entire lifetimes. Because they know each other so completely, and it only makes them love each other more.

Decades apart now, and they still tease and laugh and make each other smile. Decades with hardships and separation, and they are still playful and tender and come to each other only with love and devotion. Decades apart and still they know each other completely, fall back perfectly in sync in an instant. That is an intimacy that grew from the years they spent together, from the relationship they built, the love of an entire lifetime.