Dear Dr. Date,
Why I Should Be A Love Nurse:
I’m hooked on your column because you urge people to carry out the wishes that their inhibitions, inertia and whatnot are preventing them from carrying out. I admire that, and I think that’s the job of a Love Nurse. A person might not come into the world with an exact vision of the life or relationship(s) she or he wants. Encounters with all aspects of life and with many lifestyles, as well as years of trial and error, are usually necessary to develop such visions, but his or her wishes provide some inklings of that ideal life or relationship.
Though you might not like what I do, I think my own life’s work is similar to your work of convincing people to act on their wishes and create better lives for themselves. My work is to develop experiences (some performances, some ceremonies) for myself and others to undergo, experiences I call “beautiful,” though some people call them “intense” or “vivid.” My work also includes trying to persuade people to move into lives of beauty — lives I believe they already wish for or at least recognize (though they might not construe that recognition as a wish) in situations like when a sentence jumps out of its context in a book, and its image strikes them as amazing.
A lot of the kids I grew up with found the lives they were handed boring, empty or meaningless, and that’s part of my motivation. One idea you suggest to a lot of readers is that love, sex and romance, the only half-good things that were normal back in my town, have the potential to be really good. I’d love to urge people toward that potential in more than my own private relationships by being a love nurse. And I’m experienced in helping people act on their wishes. For two years, I’ve been in what’s planned to be a permanent relationship. (I’m a she; he’s a he.) I’m deeply in love, and I’m not looking for anyone else, though I don’t think that a permanent monogamous relationship fits everyone’s foot, and I’d be excited to help anyone who wanted to fall in love with more than one person, have sex with more than one person, spend her or his whole life dating or whatever.
— SS

If you, too, want to be one of my legendary Love Nurses, then get to a computer and type this address into your browser: www.mndaily.com! There you will find the form to enter the “I Want to be a Love Nurse” essay contest. Act quickly because Friday is approaching fast. Dr. Date’s March Mixer is this Friday at 7:00 p.m. See ya at the Weisman!