A BoB short:
Val Theroux, 64, a retired nurse from Kamloops, B.C. has been in a long distance relationship since 2008. Although Theroux has been married to another partner for 40 years, she feels compelled to visit her sturdy “soul mate” every year for a well deserved hug. The love affair is so intense that it has made London’s Daily Mail.
However, Theroux’s hunk is more like a trunk. She is in love with an oak tree located in New Forrest, Hampshire. Theroux even keeps tabs on her “tree lover” with Google Earth. “I love my husband dearly, I would never look sideways at another man, except this tree,” she told the newspaper.
Theroux says she has been enjoying relationships with trees since she was little. She attributes her communication skills with inanimate objects generally to her training in shamanism as well as reiki, a holistic Japanese healing process.
“Different people have different affinities for different things,” she told The Toronto Star from the U.K., while on her most recent trip to see her . . . man. “I have great affinities for the trees and I particularly love the trees over here . . . it is not an unnatural relationship. It doesn’t replace a human relationship, it’s just another relationship.”
Individuals who have emotional or romantic relationships with inanimate objects are classified as objectum sexuals. The behaviour came into mainstream view when an American woman married the Eiffel Tower in 2007. Since her wedding, Erika Eiffel has founded OS Internationale, a web community dedicated to raising awareness of “objectophilia.”
– Emily Olesen
