SAME OR DIFFERENT?

What, I often wonder, brings couples together? What, I think as I look at two people in love, did he see in her, or her in him? I don't mean those questions as mean or malicious, but as a statement of curiosity. I truly want to know what brings any two people together into a relationship. When he first looked at her, what did he see that drew him in her direction? When she first looked at him, what attracted, or repelled, her?
If, as the saying goes, opposites attract, then shouldn't we be drawn to people who've endured a completely opposite childhood? If I grew up with an alcoholic, abusive parent then I should be attracted to someone who comes from an Ozzie-and-Harriet background, right?
Well, not so fast.
See, I don't think we truly are drawn to our complete opposite, except that men are drawn to women and women to men, for the most part. And while comedians and even some writers want to point out the ways in which men and women are different -- and if you haven't noticed that we are then we need to sign you up for both a refresher biology course and far more interpersonal relationships with the opposite (see!) sex -- we are and probably should be drawn more to our similarities than our differences.
Study after study has shown, for instance, that the male who was the eldest in his family often weds a female who was eldest in her family, and youngest child marries youngest child. And people who grew up in big families are drawn to someone who grew up in a big family. People who grew up in wealth tend to wed others who shared a similar background.
Of course, no two people are ever completely alike and so there are always going to be differences, no matter what our backgrounds are. And it is those subtle and smaller differences, I think, that we tend to focus on too often while ignoring the commonalities and similarities.
That said, we sometimes -- and I speak here from hard-won experience -- dismiss the glaring, large, ominous differences with someone because we bought into that whole "opposites attract" line. I think too often people connect, wed or just pour themselves into relationships with people so fundamentally different from themselves simply because they believe that is what they are supposed to want. Just like society has and continues to hammer into our minds that women and men must look some idealized, stylized way (men with layer upon layer of muscles, perfect teeth and hair and chiseled jaws; women with Barbie-like bodies, too much makeup, perfect teeth and skin and long, polished nails and hair), so, too, have we swallowed -- hook, line and sinker -- this idea that we should be attracted to someone opposite to us.
I don't think so.
Even when I was younger I think that "opposites attract" thing sounded a little lame to me, but back then I was stunned if any woman/girl gave me so much as a glance, let alone a second look. She might have really been from Venus as far as I knew or cared, the slightest interest was all I wanted. As I've aged, though, I realize and cherish the value of a woman with whom I share interests, passions, ideas, faith, romance, friendship, companionship and many other commonalities, traits I find important to what I seek in a relationship. I don't want someone different from me. And I can't fathom why anyone would.