Pathways

It's the summer of 1981. I'm in a long-term relationship with Ms X (a divorcee who might have left her husband to be with me) and we've bought a house together near Bethnal Green in East London. We both have good jobs which we enjoy, a wide circle of friends, a metropolitan social life, and we talk of having kids one day when the time is right. Life seems good and to all intents and purposes, we're set (as they say).

But within weeks, a new young woman has joined the company I work for, as part of the team I'm in. Before too long, (you've guessed it), Ms Y and I fall in love. I used to wonder why stuff like this happens to people who seem perfectly happy. Now I know. Everything has suddenly changed. It's all about love's mysterious pathways to the heart. I write a poem about how this metamorphosis feels and give it a planetary spin:

Metamorphosis

At a still small point
between ignorance and bliss,
something changed…
atoms re-arranged,
a cosmic combination clicking into place
to unlock such graceful possibilities
as tilt a world
into orbits new and strange.

To invert Joni Mitchell's "You don't know what you've got till it's gone", this feels more like "You don't know what you haven't got till it's there." Written in the stars? That's just a metaphor, right? 

Conflicted by a loyalty I feel to Miss X which is at odds with the fact that I desperately want to be with Miss Y, and not wanting to carry on an illicit affair, I choose to embrace the new pathway and break up the long-term relationship. It is messy.

There is guilt, of course, but there is also such happiness, even if this is the road to perdition. The fallout is considerable. My parents and some friends think I'm a bad person. (In fact my mother refuses to talk to me for months.) I thank goodness Ms X and I have no children that need to be taken into account in this reckoning.

Eventually the dust settles, and as for the road to perdition, Miss Y and I go on to marry, have two beautiful daughters and spend the next twenty-two years together. 

Pathways to the Heart

For those of you who think it is also merely metaphor to talk of the heart (rather than the brain) as the seat of love, you might be interested in this piece from an article about neural pathways and 'heart memory':

 
"Science just proved your heart holds memory - measured,  peer-reviewed, biological fact. The human heart contains an intrinsic neural network, emits a structured, coherent electromagnetic field, and demonstrates synaptic, biochemical, and geometric mechanisms for encoding information - comparable to memory centres in the brain.

Neuroscience researchers have documented over 40,000 neurons embedded within the heart wall. These form ganglia, display synaptic plasticity, and operate with a degree of autonomy once thought exclusive to the brain. This changes everything we thought we knew about where memory lives.

The Intrinsic Cardiac Nervous System (ICNS) is capable of sensory processing, short-term memory encoding, and bidirectional brain communication. Cardiac neurons express acetylcholine, norepinephrine, and dopamine - the same neurotransmitters used in hippocampal memory. They learn, adapt, and remember.

Peer-reviewed studies show heart neurons are organized in ganglia, supported by glial scaffolding, contain microtubules (linked to quantum coherence), and encode memory via phase-locked vibrational patterns - mirroring brain-based spatiotemporal memory mechanisms.

The heart emits a magnetic field up to 5,000x stronger than the brain’s, extending up to 2 meters, measurable via magnetocardiography (MCG), and modulated by emotional state. This field is structured, not random—and communicates coherent signals via afferent pathways to the brain. Its waveform encodes not just rhythm, but affective state.

What is more, peer-review case studies reveal memory transfer in heart transplant cases, with recipients inheriting donor-specific traits: food cravings, emotional tendencies, even handwriting. One 8-year-old began dreaming of being murdered - details matched the donor’s cause of death. Another woman developed cravings for chicken nuggets and beer - never consumed them before, but her donor had loved both. These cases defy standard neuroscience but align with cardiac memory field models.

Memory = geometry + coherence + frequency. The heart acts as a morphogenetic field archive. Heart neurons store identity through phase-locked resonance. Healing is signal restoration. This model merges neurocardiology, biophotonics, fractal neuroscience, and field dynamics. Your heart doesn’t just beat. It remembers."

Mulling over the possible implications of all of the heart stuff above on my train journey back from Liverpool to Blackpool this evening, I devised the following darkly comic poem (subject to modification in the days to come).

Change Of Heart

Caroline was one delighted wife

to have her husband back

after a massive cardiac arrest

nearly stole his life. He had

a rotten heart, but luckily

a donor organ enabled 

Frank to enjoy a fresh start. 

They met the grieving widow,

Jane, to thank her for Tom's gift

and to commiserate. For all three,

affairs would never be the same

again. But soon, apart from new 

vigour, Frank developed 

an appetite for things he'd never

been partial to before:

oysters, whisky, marmalade, 

football (Port Vale -Tom's team),

bird-watching, showers not baths

and making love doggy-fashion.

A rift began to show, his wife

not so delighted anymore, And

Frank, behind her back, sought

out the lonely widow on his own.

They developed such a passion 

for each other that he realised

he no longer loved poor Caroline,

her fussy ways, her timid nature.

He was bound to leave her. But

how to explain what he felt, that

his heart really belonged to Jane.

As for the phrase about pathways to the heart, let me take you back to 1981 again, to one of my favourite LPs of that year by the Scottish band Josef K. This is from their album 'The Only Fun In Town'. Just click on the song title: Heart Of Song  Enjoy!

Thanks for reading, S ;-)