When will I understand love?

When I was studying in college a close friend of mine had a very monstrous mother, she was full of devilish attributes and hated by all, so much that I still loath the image and sight of her. She would easily be the most unreasonable and cruel woman I have ever known but my friend loved her no end. I could never understand then (nor can I now) how could one like, let alone love, a person so devilish and unkind. But my dear friend was different: she indeed loved her devil incarnate mother

I am aware that daughters are more attached to their mothers but this kind of love, which ignores cruelty and forgives brutality, is still beyond me. I have also come across other countless stories of such so-called love, and not just limited to India, where wives love their nasty and drunk husbands; where daughters still yearn for affection of their fathers who had secretly molested them during puberty; and of girls of my generation who crave for bad boys known for their ill ways

I have tried and made attempts in past to understand better what this kind of love actually is but all have come to nought, the only time perhaps I came somewhat close was during an Art of Living discourse where I realized that true love is actually beyond rationality and logic. And someone like me, who relentlessly tries to analyze moon and stars understandably will never understand love which explains why I have to think hard whenever it comes to love; someone told me once that I should start here by keeping a pet to atleast understand affection first

I also heard somewhere that true love is the one which hurts; now I did not even attempt to know what this means, after all novices can never learn rocket science

But yes I do understand lust, if not love, and a lot of it. I have now become regular with visiting cabarets here and love the uninhibited flesh display there; I am a porn freak and enjoy good quality stuff; I have made out with guys in hostel and enjoyed it no end; and off late I can do a bit of dirty talking as well

But over and beyond the enticing lure of lust lies the tender care of love which I am still trying to decipher. Maybe in the past I have been ignorant of my own failed understandings but now that I have to somewhere start making something of this damned life, I better begin to understand a bit of this illogical thing called love