Love

Of all that a person might feel, what can be better than love? Nothing. Nothing as in the sense of emptiness, the vacuum. But remember that love is not a function rooted always to another person. It is rooted first before anything else to the “I.” Love is meaningless unless one says, “I love.” After that, one can put any word current or still to be. And still it will make sense.

I love my lover, my husband, my wife, my children, my dog. Or you can say, I love life, the world, the universe, work. I love my God, my car, my money. I love the revolution. I love love. Or you can use a verb. I love bowling, talking, standing, walking, sitting, watching, writing. Or use the negative form. I love not walking, not doing anything. Use instead an article. I love an. I love a. I love the. I love words. Pronouns work best. I love them, him, her. I love me. I love you. I love (blank). I love anything. It works like a universal sentence.

And one can love what one has just as much as one can love what one does not have. Love has nothing to do with possession. It should not have anything to do with control. One cannot love well that which is perfect by any means. One cannot love perfectly that who is perfectly obedient. Love presupposes not obedience. It presupposes instead freedom. And that which is free is always beyond control. It is subject only to sentiment, subject to the accident of emotion, subject also to reason, but not the strict reasoning of logic. Love does not follow the laws of physics. Love is subject to reasoning only at its most whimsical.

Which is the reason why children are lovable. Children do not always do as we please. We love them when they are well behaved. We secretly love them even more when they defy our best reasons. We want what is best for them. But there are times when they know better than us. And so love must listen and listen well.

Love presumes an acceptance of the nature of life. We can try to be in control but life itself frustrates us in turn. We can try to predict the travel of life. But we can never do it perfectly well. And so we love and we love consistently no matter where life takes us. We love no matter what. Love is always a surrender to fate.

Love is rooted in time. People who love spend time together. And when they cannot be together, they write or use the phone. And if that is not possible, they think. They remember. We cannot say there is no love in absence. Failing anything else, love in absence is not impossible. It is only more difficult. Love is timeless. It is beautiful in the here and now. It is even better in anticipation. It is just as well in remembrance.

And so we keep with us memories of love. When did we first learn to love? At first, we did not know it was even there. The more fortunate among us grew up ensconced in it so that it became invisible.  We may have learned to love first by feeling a desire for that which was most distant, those things we knew we could not have nor could ever have. In time, we learn to love those who are closer. And thus, we hold close those whom we love. We know we have grown well when we realize finally that it is best to love those who have the most need of our love, those for whom our love truly matters.

And then we learn to love not as an act of emotion, a product of biology or chemistry, a hotness from our loins. We learn to love as sacrifice. And then, we begin to see why that is the most important love of all.

There is love that ebbs and rises like the tide. And then there is love that is the result of human will; love that is a purpose we assign for ourselves uncaring of the rising and falling of fortune, love that exists beyond consideration of gain or loss, love that lies beyond the realm of forethought. We love simply. We love as children. We could do worse or better. Instead, we choose to love this love. And we are all the better for it.