Love Month, Day 28: Love is...

Okay. So we all know the whole "love is patient, love is kind..." bible verse. But what else is love?

Love is smiling when you don't feel like smiling but because the other person deserves a smile. Love is giving away the last piece of your favorite dessert. Love is taking the time to make yourself happy. Love is being willing to die so another person can live. Love is inside every one of us. Love is what keeps our faith alive, despite the most tragic of circumstances. Love is buying a spontaneous gift because you know it'll make the person smile. Love is opening up the gates inside of ourselves and letting someone else in. Love is knowing someone's flaws and loving them anyway. Love is knowing you can tell someone anything and they won't judge you. Love is a smile in a crowded room. Love is following your heart, no matter what. Love is those chance moments that work in our favor. Love is doing something when you aren't asked. Love is more important than anything. Love is honoring the memory of a lost loved one. Love is not fear. Love is laughter. Love is a blinding blue sky. Love is the pure smile of a baby. Love is letting people know how you feel. Love is saying you're sorry even if you aren't. 

Love is, quite literally, all around.

Love Month, Day 27: Remember?

Only one more day left in the month. I don't think I'll have a theme next month. Some days I didn't feel like writing about one particular topic.

Music plays a very big role in my life. I have a song for virtually every moment in my life. Walking to class with my ipod in, I fit memories to songs I listen to. In this respect I think I was meant to be a film director. Or maybe a music video creator. I would make one heck of a montage.

One song that has particular importance to me is "Remember When" by Alan Jackson. It's a song about a couple's life together. I like to play videos in my mind of my grandparent's marriage, and my parent's, even though I wasn't there for 90% of the scenes I think about. So I guess it's more romantic than fact. 

I also think about it in terms of one particular boy that is now gone from my life. Two-thirds of the lyrics don't apply, but I really just get stuck on the line "remember when?" He was there through some of the most painful times in my life. We had a very Noah-and-Allie from the Notebook relationship. We probably fought as much as we got along, but there's a certain beauty in fighting. Because fighting brings up such emotion. And because most of our fights were because we were too much alike. There were times when I thought I'd marry him, because we fit so seamlessly into each other's lives. It was the first time loving someone felt as natural as breathing. I don't know that I loved him in the traditional sense, but that previous sentence doesn't carry the same weight if I said "liking him felt as natural as breathing".

Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. The point is, he had a significant role in my life. There was pain, but there was a lot of joy. 

Sometimes I think about seeing him on the street in twenty years. He'd have his own life, and I'd have mine, and we'd both be happy with where we were. I would sincerely smile at him and laugh, saying, "Remember when?"

Love Month, Day 26: Young Love

"when we ran like wild horses through the night, sticking to the backroads and staying out of sight, making the most out of what little time we had left, how sweet it is, how sweet it was, young love" - Carter's Chord

As I grow older, I look back with more and more sentiment about my younger years. I wouldn't want to go back and relive them, but there were so many sweet memories that were so scary at the time...sneaking out of the house...driving with the headlights off...sneaking kisses in that park behind the woods. I remember when everything felt so new and exhilarating.

While first times cannot be redone, but I hope I can hold onto that feeling the older I get. You know the feeling, the one that came after all those scary moments, when your heart starts fluttering and you can't believe you are lucky enough to be alone with this boy. 

I'm an impasse between that teenage excitement and the more adult relationships and possible (hopeful!) marriage in my future. I was lucky back then, the experiences I got. I really do feel like a lucky person. I believe--or at least I have faith--that that luck will continue throughout my life.

Love Month, Day 25: Sing it, Otis

I am madly, crazily in love with Otis Redding. A few months after my love affair developed, I discovered he died in 1967 at the age of 26. Plane crash. 

I cried. 

Anyway. It's music like his that make me want to slow dance with someone. My husband better like Otis Redding, because we will be slow-dancing in the kitchen after dinner many a night. In that same kitchen, I want to teach my sons to slow dance. I want them to remember the smell of dish soap and my perfume when they dance with their daughters in their own kitchens.

(I have an overactive imagination.)

I want to hold on to these little things that are important to me. I want to remember to dance. I know my dreams will happen someday, in some shape. I just know in about 5 years I'm going to be slow dancing in a kitchen with the man of my dreams, and I'm going to cry. Because when my dreams come true, my heart right done explodes in my chest. 

These aren't big dreams, but most of my dreams aren't. My biggest dreams are wrapped up in tiny moments. I want to dance in the kitchen. I want to sing lullabies. I want the most simple and yet sublime life imaginable. I want barbecues in the summer and boisterous Christmas mornings. I want to cook my husband dinner every night, not because it's the woman's job but because I want to. I don't want stardom or wild success or a million friends. I just want a quiet little life in a quiet little town filled with quiet little moments that make me cry. I want to be happy with whatever comes my way.

I sincerely believe my dreams are going to come true. Because really, what other option is there other than wholeheartedly believing in your dreams?

Love Month, Day 23: Time, time, time

It's late. 

It's actually the 24th, even though I wrote day 23. It's only been day 24 for 17 minutes. Cut a girl some slack. 

I should have been asleep 17 minutes ago, too. But alas I can't sleep. It happens sometimes. It's strange how, even when I live alone, I can notice when I'm up past my bedtime and that quiet comes over the world. I've spent most of my life with this time alone. My body and sleep are not the best of friends. I always think it'll be good when I have my babies, because I don't need much sleep.

(I'm sure I'll regret those words when the day comes though.)

A lot of times I think about how such and such a task or such and such an aspect of my personality will be useful when I get married and have children. I know that such thoughts are useless, and that I put too much stock in future happiness and not present happiness. 

I don't know that that is true. I think I'm just ready to have my own life. It's strange how certain changes are slow and yet fast. A few years ago, I would have wanted nothing more than to go home to my parents. Now, I want my own life. I don't know when the change happened, but oh boy, it happened. I can't wait to build a house and build love and just be.

It all takes time, I suppose. But I am impatient. And sleepless. Restless, maybe.

Love Month, Day 19: Love and Happiness

All I want in my life is love and happiness.

I think it's all I ever wanted.

Sometimes I easily forget that in order to get those things we must give. We must give love to get love. We must...well we don't need to give happiness to get it, but a certain percentage of being happy is actively deciding to be happy.

Let this post be the living testament of me remembering those things.

Love Month, Day 18: ?

I don't know what I love today.

But I feel compelled to write every day this month.

So, today is the day of the unknown love. 

Love Month, Day 17: Loving one another.

Today in art history (oh, how I love art history. but I suppose that's for another post) we were looking at this ol' piece:

Isenheim Altarpiece. During discussion, my professor mentioned that the artist made Jesus look ill like the patients at the hospital that the monks took care of. He did that so that they could remember Christ in the suffering of ordinary people. And, because we are all children of God, Jesus is in everyone, and therefore we should love everyone as we love Jesus.

As I say in most of my posts, this isn't necessarily about believing in Jesus. It's about finding the best in people, and showing everyone the love we reserve for the most important people, whether in heaven or on earth. I don't think this means throwing yourself at everyone's feet, but just choosing love instead of anger or repulsion. It's tempting to get irritated by a particularly annoying comment in class, or someone who cuts you off (driving or on foot), or at something else not going our way when it comes to other people. 

But we can also love them for it and show them kindness. I think that this is hard, and it's something I know I am going to struggle with, but I want to keep it in my mind because I really believe that people deserve the best of me and not the worst.

Love Month, Day 16: City love.

This picture is from the London Eye. London is, hands down, my favorite city. I suppose that makes me sound uppity and worldly, but I am just madly in love with England. I love American cities too, but something about London just makes me swoon.

Love Month, Day 15: Lifelong love.

My grandparents have been married for more than two-thirds of their lives. 

Considering the sheer amount of time, I can imagine that they weren't all good years. Not to belittle my grandparent's marriage, but it's hard to believe there were not any hard times. It makes me realize that, although I've never been married, part of marriage must be about choice. The same is true of friendships, and other relationships other than romantic. There are times in everyone's life when they have to decide whether your wounds are worth ending a friendship or relationship. You have to choose whether or not you can still love that person. 

The answer is not always easy, or quick. But people make these decisions every day, every year. We choose to look past the ways in which people irritate us. This choice is made because we love these people. 

Sometimes pain is too great to bear. Sometimes the arguments are no longer worth keeping the person in your life. My point isn't to put down people that have gotten divorced, because their choice is just as valid as staying in a relationship. We all make the best decision we can, out of love for the person, out of love for ourselves, out of love for the other people in our lives.

Love makes the world go around, however it manifests itself.

Love Month, Day 14: The big day.

Happy Valentine's Day! 

Love Month, Day 13: Unanswered prayers.

"Some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers," - Garth Brooks, in the song Unanswered Prayers

Sometimes I get the blues about some aspects of my past. There are so many things I'd go back and do differently, but unless someone invents a time machine, that's impossible. So I have to blindly believe that all the mistakes and tears in my past are leading somewhere good. 

This largely applies to dating, which the song has to do with. As much as I've had terrible relationship experiences, I believe that I will ultimately meet someone and I will know that there was a reason for all my pain and suffering, because it led me to the right person.

Out of necessity I have to believe that there is something great in my future that God is leading me to. I say out of necessity because when I start to let myself think that it's always going to be this way, I get more and more depressed.

And since we are only ever in the present, I think that this also requires paying attention to your blessings, however few and far between they feel. Even in the midst of the most painful times in our lives, there are so many blessings. It's just a matter of seeing them. And I think as a human race, that is one of the hardest things we have to overcome. It's tempting to think "why me?". Well, why not you? I truly believe God fits the back to the burden. He only gives us what we can handle. 

It occurs to me that this post doesn't have much to do with love. Well, I suppose it's God's love. or even if you don't believe in God, it's about noticing all the love in your life. 

Love Month, Day 12: Letter to my heart.

When I opened this post box I had grand plans for what i'd say in a letter to my heart, but then I realized I think I'm too young to have any real perspective. So this is more a letter to the future of my heart rather than the past.

Dear heart,

Don't be so afraid of letting someone love you. Petty teenage romances are not indicative of how the world feels about you. You have worth, and you deserve love just as much as any other heart out there.

I know it feels like the walls you built are safe, but just as they block out bad things they also block out good things. Opening up means allowing in great joy and great sorrow. Whatever is in store for us, we can take it. 

Let life happen as it's going to. As much as you want to control everything, sometimes it's better to sit back and wait.

Show more love to the world at large. Your feelings are so hidden that even sometimes the brain isn't aware of how you feel. Don't hold your cards so close. People want to be let in, even if you don't believe it.

Love,

Me

Sometimes I lay really still and watch my heartbeat on my stomach. If you hold your breath for a few seconds you can see your skin pulse. I guess it's not a heartbeat as much as blood rippling by, but I like seeing visual representation of all the processes at work keeping me alive. I guess you can see it in all parts of your body if you are still enough, but I personally like watching my stomach.

I don't know what that has to do with anything. I just got reminded of it when I was thinking about my heart.

Love Month, Day 11: New love.

This post isn't really about love. It's about...well, butterflies I guess. It's that feeling you get when you meet someone new, and you are curious and cautious and wanting to talk to them all the time even if you don't really know them. 

At this point I always have to restrain myself from planning our future. Usually because said boy (well i suppose at this age it's man) is barely even at friend status. But I always get excited about the rush I feel when I meet a new person. 

I think (hope) that it's normal to wonder what role a person will have in your life. 

Perhaps I spend too much time by myself.

Love Month, Day 10: Live the life you love, love the life you live.

I am absolutely terrible at loving my own life.

I'm working on it. I really am. But some part of my brain is hardwired to remember my faults and everyone else's victories. When you live 24 hours a day, seven days a week with yourself, it's hard to remember that there is goodness inside yourself.

I kind of think it's like how when we're on vacation and our family or friends drive us crazy because we have to spend virtually all our time with them. It's tempting to lose sight of what you love about someone because there is so much that is irritating you in the here and now. 

My mantra with my friends that irritate my most is they mean well. Even if someone drives me insane, they usually (i hope) aren't doing it intentionally. I suppose it'd be helpful to repeat that to myself as well. 

Love Month, Day 9: Birth.

Today is my birthday. I am 22. 

It still feels weird to write that age. For some reason it seems like a huge leap from 21. It's the first birthday where I've been aware that I am now an adult, even if I've legally been one for four years now. I know it's not that old, but it's old for me. 

Being the romantic that I am, I always like to think about what my birth must have felt like to my parents. I suppose that makes me sound extremely selfish, but I only mean it in that as my biological clock ticks louder and louder I can't help but be curious about what it feels like to have a baby. I am also a writer at heart that loves to think about these emotions in how I would explain them, so they naturally are more flowery than they might actually be in real life.

I think we all want to know that we were wanted, and important, and loved from the very first breath we took. While I never doubt that my parents loved (and love) me, I intend to actively tell my children how much their birth meant to me. 

Because I think that's all anyone needs, or needs to do. Give more love. Tell people how we feel more often. I want to show everyone in my life, however they ended up there, just how precious they are to me. How glad I am that my parents decided to have me. 

Sometimes I think just being alive is a huge honor. 

Love Month, Day 8: Cooookie

I really love this one type of cookie. I rarely buy them because I'm pretty sure they are 95% butter and 5% chocolate which means they are 100% bad for you.

But I really love them. They make me happy. I bought a box of them today, and I intend to enjoy them with reckless abandon because I haven't bought them in literally years. 

And then I'll go to they gym to burn off the five pounds I'm going to gain from eating them :)

Love Month, Day 7: Higher love.

Many people across the world believe in some form of higher power. I think the name is largely unimportant, because they all essentially mean the same thing. I think we all want to believe that something or someone is in control and has some vested interest in our well-being. There are a variety of other reasons why people want to believe, or do believe, but I haven't the time to explore them all.

My point is, we all want to know someone loves us.

I think that we are all loved. I also think that love doesn't mean life is going to be perfect and easy, in fact I think love is shown equally strongly when things go wrong in our lives. Whoever - or whatever - cares enough to allow bad things to happen because we will ultimately learn important things from them, and they may lead us to a better place. I am hesitant to post this (not that anyone really reads this) because there are probably 100 examples to the contrary of my opinion. There is no particular basis for these opinions in science or theology. 

It's just the way I think the world operates.

Love Month, Day 6: Won't you take my hand, darling, on that old dance floor

It's funny how much four years can change you.

I suppose that is true throughout our lives. A newborn is very different from a four-year-old. An eight-year-old is very different from a twelve-year-old. A thirteen-year-old is very different from a....well, you get my point. 

My college career has changed me, mostly for the better. It's strange to see the new freshman acting like I once was. As different as humans are, we are largely the same as we travel through life. We are all human, after all.

I am relatively young, and yet I have tired of the wild and crazy lifestyle of a young person. I look back fondly on my years of spreading my wings and experiencing new things, but I am so excited about venturing on to the next phase of my life. 

I am so, so happy to be equipped with a newfound optimism about my future. It's like being born again, which I also feel like happens throughout our lives. We are ever-evolving, ever realizing that what worked for us at one point no longer fits. We grow physically, emotionally, spiritually. 

In this respect I realize there is nothing to fear about the future. All I need to do is look forward with open eyes and progress along this journey of life as best I can.

Love Month, Day 5: More love

Sometimes I get impatient with my loved ones. We all do. Of course, I feel like my brain is especially equipped to go from zero to thinking of the most evil thing I could say to a person in sixty seconds. 

Thankfully I know how to bite my tongue.

I've also recently developed the ability to step back and ask myself if getting angry is worth it. I think it comes with age, I don't necessarily believe I've made some discovery others haven't been making for centuries. I think we all get to that point where we mature enough to think about what we're doing before we swing back.

I try and replace my anger with love. Generally my frustration is derived from the person trying to help and failing rather than them intentionally irritating me. I'm not perfect, and I'm probably still more cross to people than I should be, but amongst my many failures it's nice to notice when you are doing something right, sometimes, somewhat.

Love Month, Day 4: What we do

"Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is more people who have come alive." - John Eldredge

One of the most beautiful things, in my opinion, is watching someone do something they love. As a college student, I have the most exposure to professors who are clearly passionate about their subject. Some are more passionate than others, but the nature of professorship is that you have to love it because you toil for years only to make virtually no money.

I think it is also one of the most attractive things about the opposite sex. When I find something a boy really likes, I love to ask questions about it because I find it so lovely to see them so...well, alive. 

I feel such a rush when I do things I love. It makes me want to chase that feeling, even if I don't know where it's going to take me at this point. 

Love Month, Day 3: Oh my heart

Every time I see a particular group of my friends, my heart aches with happiness. I don't see them often, so perhaps distance does make the heart grow fonder.

Maybe this is a universal feeling, but I know I personally leave tiny bits of my heart with everyone I care about and so when I see these people it's like an empty part of my heart is filled up again. 

Well, I suppose that makes me sound like I have a half-empty heart, but I don't feel that way. Maybe my heart is like electricity, where its constantly running but sometimes it surges. Maybe this feeling is indicative of not having enough love in my life. While that may be true, I feel like the lack is also a blessing.

This is because I feel extremely lucky to be (relatively) old and still have an excitable heart. I am glad to not be too used to love that I am jaded by it. I do believe it will be an asset in my future, to some degree. I hope I am able to maintain this throughout my life. 

Love Month, Day 2: This Kind of Love.

I am absolutely obsessed with This Kind of Love by Sister Hazel.

This kind of love makes me feel ten feet tall

It makes all my problems fall

This kind of trust helps me to hold the line

I'll be there every time

I want this to be my wedding song. Well, I mean that in a kind of abstract way, because it seems silly to pick a wedding song before you have a groom. But what I like about this song is that it approaches love as a kind of quiet, humble thing. I mean I guess the words aren't too unlike any other song about love, but it seems like the lyrics are conveying a message of love making you a better person, or at least want to be a better person. It doesn't feel like love on a pedestal.

This kind of love, it's what I dreamed about

Yeah fills me up, baby it leaves no doubt

This kind of love is why I'm standing here

It's something that we can share

I can't get enough of this kind of love

Obviously this song is about romantic love, but I think it applies to many different situations. The love my friends and family have showed me constantly inspires me to be a better person. However, I can't wait to share the kind of love between a husband and a wife, because it seems like a heightened kind of love. Partially because our hearts are much more invested. I hope that whenever I get married that it is a good kind of love can last us for the rest of our lives.

This kind of hope is what I tried to find

And now I can't deny I believe

This kind of faith is so unshakable

It's unmistakable, it's bigger than me

This particular verse reminds of my newfound spirituality. Having newly come into true faith, I am constantly taken aback by how wonderful it feels to be led by something bigger than myself. It makes it a lot easier to get through each day when I take the time to think about my blessings and all the great things that await me.

Your love can move mountains

It makes my world go round

It's always there to guide me

I'm so lucky that I've found this kind of love

This is another verse that I feel is more universal. Even if we don't have a significant other, the love in our life is so important. I really do feel so lucky to have as much love as I do, even if it isn't perfect.

Love Month, Day 1: Love, love, love.

Seeing as this is the month of Valentine's, I'm going to write about love this month. Love in all shapes and sizes, the kind of love we feel for friends and family and neighbors and perhaps most importantly, ourselves.

Because I truly believe that we cannot give out love unless we love ourselves. This truth has proved itself more and more in my life. 

I don't presume to know very much about love. But I know that I love love, so I'm going to explore it for 28 days. Maybe I'll learn a thing or two along the way