Love Letters

Vanessa, a sweet soul (Vanessa's Runway) paid me a kind compliment two posts back and then mentioned my possibly writing love letters.

I must admit, I've never written one or a love poem. Received letters and poems? Perhaps. Modesty forbids one from discussing details. The truth is, in my mind, those didn't count, because the emotion (carefully avoiding the word - love) was not reciprocated.

I truly admire people who can profess love through a letter, without knowing how the beloved receiver may react. It is brave, it is hopeful, sometimes it's just foolish. But I would rather encounter an honest fool than a dishonest vagabond. Did I just type vagabond? Alas must be the Browning influence.

Secretly too, sometimes, I peer out from under an emotional hat, wondering what it must be like to love the sender of a love letter. I've never been in love, not even close. I guard my heart carefully and want to be with one person and not waste a lifetime tasting the fall-aways. This may seem quaint and old-fashioned in this day and age, but I'm OK with that. Although I do tend to hear the chorus of "When one has so much love to give it would be a waste not to marry...". People mean well. Yet, one cannot force love, one cannot conjure chemistry or forge true understanding. It is so much easier to be friends than to know who your life partner should be.

So when I come across a love letter, a genuine profession of the beating heart, It moves me, in a sweet sad way that can only be compared to looking through glass at a beautiful sight you cannot touch. Then I close the shutters. And reality crowds in like welcome clouds. I am reminded how blessed I am, how gifted with good people and true love in other ways.

The rose you see above is a love letter. One picked by my father to give to my mother. After decades of marriage I am touched by how sweetly they can share love. In ways I cannot describe here, they bring an example for me to look up to. I also see it in my friends, a couple who have been through so much in a youthful marriage, perhaps the sum of challenges some face in decades and still their strength and faith revives and holds up their love. They are amazing to me. They make the choice to see the good in everyday and each other. I think the best examples of love to me are those who choose to work as a team, no matter what and make it them against life's inevitable tests. Perhaps that is the best love letter, the unwritten, never finished one. Where the pages are years and the words are their actions.

Love is such a delicate beautiful giver, of the heart and the mind. I am reminded that if anyone wants proof of God they need only think of love. I hope you can all take the time to treasure the soul that is entwined with yours today. Feel free to write a love letter, or even share it. This wonderland was made with love. So I guess, these posts are my journey but also, my love letter to you.

Peace,
x