Love

On the subject of love I wish to write not as an authority but an observer. As a fly on the wall, if you will. Having not experienced a great deal of it, all I have is an opinion. I write not as a psychologist, neither is this a theological perspective. It is as I have seen and heard and — on those infrequent times — felt. And so on the subject of love I write thus:

Love is rare. To have love reciprocated rarer — a miracle even! Don’t take this for granted. Love long and hard; fight for it, tough it out in the difficult times, forgive often because it is worth the effort. Love as unconditionally as humanly possible. Hold fast to it, because losing it is too heavy a loss. Even if you do get it back it is not the same. It leaves a trail of broken hearts, and often still, the unintended consequences of having innocent people caught up in the hurt.

Don’t seek it out if you don’t plan to go the distance. Though it is often said it is better to have loved and lost than not loved at all, the magnitude of the loss is rarely spoken of. To love and lose is devastating. Don’t treat it casually because matters of the heart hurt like hell.

But love anyway, because love is a gift, it is unavoidable if you intent to keep being human. It is the inescapable inexplicable mysterious glue that holds us together. Love is messy, but still worth it. Don’t send it away if you don’t mean it because it might just go and never return.

So go on and love. Love with your heart and with your mind. Love as you’d want to be loved, and then some more. Because love, when it is going well, is special and magical, and when not, it is all kinds of grief. But love still.