I found myself thinking today about what was my favourite romantic story. Of course I considered all the regulars; Romeo and Juliet, Layla and Majnun, Antony and Cleopatra, the building of the Taj Mahal or Braveheart, but then I remembered the story that made me a romantic in the first place and I love it so much I thought I'd share it with you. It comes from Greek mythology and was written in Plato's Symposium, I believe it was the original concept of soulmates. I wont just find a quote and bung it in here I'll tell it how I remember it.
Once, long ago in the ancient world man was made up of two heads, four arms and four feet. These men had incredible strength; physical strength, strength of mind and strength of heart, they were also very happy. The Gods watched these humans of their creation from Mount Olympia and were both scared that these humans would attempt to take their place and also jealous of the absolute happiness.
The Gods decided that the humans could not be allowed to continue living as they did but they could not decide what to do with them, some of the Gods wanted to destroy the humans but others were reluctant to completely destroy their finest creations. Finally Zeus came up with the solution. He hit the humans with his thunderbolt splitting them in two; each had one head, two arms, two legs but only half a soul. Then Zeus took these halves and scattered them across the globe separating them all.
With time the bodies forgot that they had ever been anything but one head, two arms and two legs but the soul never forgot that it was only a half or forgot the strength it had as a whole. It is this half a soul that drives the body to continue searching for the other half of itself. Like shells scattered on the beach there are many that look similar and may even live comfortably side by side but there is only one that is the perfect fit. A shell only has one other half, as does a soul and on occasion when these souls are reunited into one they regain all their former strength of heart and spirit; for whilst the body forgets how to become one the soul never forgets.

That story made me a hopeless romantic, and it keeps me a hopeless romantic.