The Alchemy of Romance

It seems odd to me that romance, something heralded as remarkable, miraculous, beautiful, and even awe inspiring is based on nothing more than the alchemy of brain chemicals and hormones. After all, scientists have shown that love comes about from the equation of attraction + comfort feelings + emotional bonding multiplied by sex and time spent together; none of these things being solely miraculous or worthy of a myriad of songs and poetry.

The alchemy of romance is as such:

Smell. One of the things that people choose their partner on is smell; that alchemy of scent molecules that make one person smell irresistible and others smell terrible. Deodorant, perfumes, and cologne can only take you so far; you have to just have the good luck of not smelling like a garbage pile! Fertile women smell on a subconscious level to men that makes them irresistible, but even that’s not enough. For reasons beyond your control (the substance known as MHC or major histocompatibility complex which ensures that people will only breed if there’s a good chance that the fetus will come to term, to be specific) people find each other attractive or just friends.

Taste. This same substance, MHC, can also be found in saliva and may be the reason why we kiss passionately as a way to decide whether someone is worth the time to have intercourse with or not. You could have the perfect kiss and still fail because of that pesky chemical compound.

Appearance. Of course appearance matters, but not in the way you think. Women with ample chests (duh), but also wide hips are considered more attractive to men than skinny chicks (eat your heart out diet magazines!) whereas men with broad shoulders and chests are considered most attractive. This is because large hips/breasts=better child bearing and broad shoulders/chests=ability to bring home the bacon. Even in today’s sedentary world, this still rings true.

Testosterone. Testosterone is found largely in men, but also in women. Testosterone is also a sex drive chemical and thus a romance drive chemihttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifcal. It makes people more romantically inclined and can be found not only in the body, but even in the saliva of men! So when you kiss, the women is getting a dose of testosterone which hyper drives her sex drive. So much for the romantic kiss!

Romance is also caused by a chemical hit from dopamine (a pleasure causing hormone in the brain) which makes you anticipate seeing someone or doing something, and creates more pleasure which makes you happier to see someone which leads to love and romance! The next part is serotonin and more importantly oxytocin. Oxytocin, also known as the binding chemical, makes women and men feel more attached to each other and is released in conjunction with dopamine to make a connection stick. Oxytocin is the same chemical which binds mothers fiercely to their newborn child by the way.

But for all this alchemical information, romance continues to astound researchers and lovers alike, for though it’s all very fine and well to know that what you’re feeling is being caused by brain chemicals and tens of thousands of years of breeding, nothing quite prepares you for that first rush of happiness, adrenaline, and arousal; and that my dear ladies and gentlemen is where all the poetry, sitcoms, novels and songs extolling love comes from!

But in the end, it’s all an alchemical brew.