if X then Y

There's been a lot of ill-considered talk about something called “unconditional love,” and I for one want none of it. There's no such thing. Even the requirements that the loved one be carbon-based, or sentient, or possible to conjure up in the imagination, are conditions. Unconditional love is the Monopoly money or AOL startup disc of emotional offerings. It's pink packets of saccharine. Plus, I gotta tell you, if someone said to me, “There is nothing you can do to make me stop loving you,” I would take that as a personal challenge. Watch me. I'll find something.