This post is a bit of ramble through various thoughts around love, romance and Valentines. It is inspired by the quote on Revelations this week but I think it captures both the complexity of love and the utter simplicity of it too. We are loved and we love. It is as simple and as complicated as that. It is both so very hard (especially when it comes to self love) and so very easy. Sometimes it is bold and grand and sometimes it is a Bounty bar.
“One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.”
~ Paulo Coelho
When I was planning out the prompt for Revelations I looked for a love based quote for this week as it is Valentine week. So many of them seemed to be about how love is a miracle or how we find it in someone else or how loving someone else is the most important thing. This one stood out to me because it didn’t glamourise it and it also didn’t make it seem to be only about romantic love. I liked the simplicity of it, that we love because we do and that is enough.
This love
I often think I love too easily. I fell in love in with Michael before we had even met in person. I know there will be people who roll their eyes at that or even want to dismiss it as not real but I can assure it most definitely was. I know because despite writing that I love easily the reason I knew I was in love with him was because I had not ever really been in love, in that way, before. It was like a revelation. I often say Michael taught me how to love and in the romantic sense of that word I think there some real truth to that. Or maybe what he did was show me love in a way I had never experienced before and that changed how I love too.
Either way I am happy for his love. I am happy to receive it and to return it.
Sometimes I ask him, why do you love me? And sometimes he will answer with something silly or even something not but mostly he will say, because I do. In the past I think there have been times when that has felt disappointing. There must be a reason, what about ME, makes me lovable to you? I know the answer is, because I am me because I know that is why I love him, because he is him.
Am I loveable?
Loveable is an interesting word though. Last year I saw someone tweeting about being unwell and spending the day on the sofa while their partner was visiting and how they didn’t want to do that because they wanted to be loveable for them. I got me thinking about what makes someone lovable? I feel like there is an implication that there are things you need to do or to be in order to be loveable. Do I have to be pretty enough to be lovable. Or slim enough, clever enough, quiet enough? Do I need to be a certain type of women to be loveable? The idea we are loveable, well it is one that makes me uncomfortable. I don’t know how to be loveable I know how to be me and sometimes I am pretty or sexy or polite or thoughtful but sometimes I am sad or angry or messy or smelly or sick. Just like everyone.
Types of love
I love lots of people in different ways. The love for my children is powerful and at times intense. Even when they are messy difficult humans it never wavers. I love my parents. My Mother and I have had some challenging times over the years but I love her very much and my Father too and I do believe they too love me very much.
I love my friends. I will admit I don’t have many, but the ones I do, I treasure them and I tell them all the time that I love them.
I love my pets. The cat is aloof and well, cat about it all, but the dog, he loves with a joyful abandon that is infectious.
I love a cup of tea, a good book, cuddles and snuggles, kisses and orgasms, cock and jizz and so many other things. It’s all love in some way and it all counts. The idea that romantic love is the pinnacle of love, the one to aspire to and that out weights all other is a notion that belittles the rest of love, for family, pets and the things we enjoy.
I love a Bounty
The other day Michael and I were discussing Valentine. He had suggested that we go out for lunch because everywhere is busy and expensive for dinner. We then noticed there was a new cafe opened in our town and so said we were go their for breakfast instead. That led to a discussion about Valentines and how we both felt about it.
For him it is something he likes but he is also a strong believer in showing how much you love someone all the time not just on a special day mostly created to make people buy shit and whilst I totally agree with him, particularly about the commercialisation aspect of it, I also admitted that I have a bit of a soft spot for Valentines.
Weirdly it was one of the few things my first husband used to indulge in. He would always get me a card and some little gift and I liked it. A lot actually. Over the years Michael and I have indulged in to varying degrees. He is not a card man and that is fine but he has in the past bought me gifts and I have done the same for him. I don’t want big expensive gestures but buy me a one pound bunch of daffodils and I will smile about it ALL day.
Later that day in the supermarket I saw aforementioned daffodils and bought myself a bunch. At the time I joked that now he wouldn’t have to run down here in the morning and buy me a bunch for Valentines.
I wasn’t expecting anything when I woke up this morning. We had agreed on breakfast and to be honest I had actually forgotten that today was the day but then when Michael bought me my cup of tea in bed. He does this every single morning because he loves and knows it makes my mornings better. He also handed me a Bounty bar.
Along with a Chocolate Orange a Bounty is my chocolate bar of choice so the fact he had nipped down to the corner shop this morning and bought me one to present to me with my morning tea was just about one the most romantic and sweetest things he had ever done and he has done some pretty romantic things over the years.
I grinned broadly and posted a picture on twitter just because it made me happy but also I guess to show that romance can be a Bounty bar or a cup of tea in bed or turning up to the airport with his favourite drink in the car because I know he will be thirsty. The little things count, to me far more than the big grand gestures. What I didn’t know is that he had not bought just one Bounty but in fact gone completely wild and got 5 of them. One he gave me and the other 4 he hid in various places round the house for me to find. One in my coat pocket, one in my gloves, one under my phone and one in the little bag I take when I walk the dog.
Love is many things. Big things and small things. It is looking after someone when they are sick. It is being there for them when they are anxious or scared. It is sending them messages when you are apart. It is cooking their favourite food, kissing them goodbye and hello and multiple other times during your day. it is saying I love you and it is hearing it when it is said to you and sometimes love is even a Bounty bar or five.
