What I Know About Love

We've all seen the relationships that make us smile, that make us want to "reach" when it comes to our own choices.

Our inner voices begin to ring with courageous statements like:

Hello, Lamentable Moments of My Personal History: you will not own me. 

I will not press repeat. 

and 

I deserve real happiness and someone who looks out for that as well as they look out for their own.

A moment with a really happy, got-it-together couple or other close relationship can truly inspire. Their bright lights encourage us to swiftly deny 'less than' as an option in our own situations.

My Aunt Billie and Uncle Larry were one of those neat pairings, and it was one our entire family admired. Billie and Larry were each other's second marriage.  And it lasted for many years, until Billie lost a valiant battle with cancer. 

In one another, they found their best friends, and knew to be grateful. 

Experience is such a teacher. A humbler. A willing lover if we'll embrace it.


There was never a snide comment by one about the other's quirks or weaknesses. Billie and Larry didn't allow that kind of ka-ka to seep in to their relationship. 

They had no fear whatsoever of someone giving them grief about being permanently smitten. And they laughed - a lot. 

While never entering the realm of socially awkward or showy PDA, Aunt Billie and Uncle Larry were most often seen holding hands when together. Absolutely the biggest fans of one another. 


They made it look easy. The sticking in, sticking with, staying happy. 

When Billie developed terminal cancer, they gave the disease the finger, and fought the cancer instead of one another.

Somehow, though, despite the great examples of healthy, vibrant relationships in each of our lives, you and I will sometimes give in to lesser arrangements and motivations - to not trusting our guts, to rickety, ill-born impulse, to people who rattle the cage of our insecurities, to loneliness, to the wind that howls by the clock in our minds. 

And when we do this - when we say "yes" to what will always be "no" - we bear a price without measure. We step off a cliff with no estimate of the height. 

There is a mud of compromise that sticks to your shoes and rings in your head each time you talk with or touch an ill-fitting companion.

Some of us will then swallow the 'not quite right for me' pill that never, ever makes our stomachs settle. And that pill, you must swallow - often - in order to stay.

Too many years of this, and you can become a bit unrecognizable.

I heard this week a song by the band Mumford & Sons that featured the following line:

"Where you invest your love, you invest your life."

And it hit me: We'd better make sure those are good decisions.

We get just one life to figure out how to best spend our years.

So why should we share them with anyone - or anything - that doesn't cut the mustard?

It doesn't mean the person must be perfect. It does mean they have to be kind.

And look out for you.

Make you laugh.

Make you a priority.

Be unafraid to love you...and let others know.

We're all learning daily how to save our best for those we love most - friends, family, significant others. Some days, we stink, and we lose our temper, or our minds, and say things that could have been nicer. Or left unsaid.

Other days, we win - we grow closer, and more unafraid to look someone in the eyes and say thanks and give them a great big hug. 

Isn't "I Love You" just a really precious way to say "Thank You," after all?

Thanks for taking care of my heart.

Thanks for knowing what to say.

Thanks for saying nothing and knowing everything.

Thanks for being a place of rest for me.

We all need it.

The hug - the validation - the stability of an embrace you know and trust.


It's a little miracle on our path - every time.

Love, 

Melinda


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