Give in to it

In this world, there are a lot of personal interactions we all have, everyday.  Kids, work, school, friends, family; relationships that we all experience on some level or another.  As I make my way through life, I've grown and changed in different aspects, but one thing remains constant.

I believe in love.

Call me a sap, roll your eyes, sigh in disgust; it won't matter to me. 

I believe in love.

I'm not so starry-eyed that I only believe in the hearts and flowers kind of love, either.  I've been around long enough to see how the ugly side of love can affect people too.  And how that's not always bad.

As a child, growing up, I thrived on the love of my parents, Mom in particular, of course.  My Mom was always telling us how much she loved us.  How we were so very wanted.  It was important to her that we know this, and I enjoyed hearing it.  I carried her love with me everyday, I carry it with me now, and it colors the way I look at things all the time.  You can't help but feel special, like you are destined to do great things, when you have that kind of force behind you.  I am grateful to have it. 

And the first time I held my oldest child, gazing at his perfect face (oh! those little rosebud lips!), gently touching all that newborn black hair, I understood exactly where she was coming from.  And why it was so important to tell me all the time. 

As I grew, I shaped my ideas of love like a lot of young girls do.  Movies and books moved my thinking towards that romantic kind of "will it ever happen to me?" frame of mind.  I had my share of schoolgirl crushes, I sat up at night, giggling with my friends about the possiblities, and I despaired that I might never find it.

I wasn't looking for it.  And yet, there it was.  All wrapped up in an adorable, beautiful gray-green-blue eyed seventeen year old package.  I remember being a bit taken aback under the gaze of such a cute, older boy.  But when he started showing up everywhere I went, I couldn't help myself.  My pulse quickened every time I saw him.

And I've been in love with him ever since.

It's not always a bed of roses.  We go through all the couple stuff everyone goes through.  Occasionally fight.  Usually make up.  Get annoyed, and exasperated, and wonder "What on earth am I doing?"  "How did I get here, and how do I get out of this?"  Yet the thing that holds us together, the spreads salve over any wounds, smooths over the rough spots, is love.  I love him.  When I feel like everything is just going to crap, my thoughts will turn to him.  Often, it's enough to remind me to take a deep breath so I can move on in my day.  Other times, it's enough to make me feel like I'm gonna strangle him when I see him next.  But the fact that I love him remains.

In the middle of the night, as I sweep the cobwebs of the day from my mind, I often find myself standing in the kids' rooms.  Listening to their little snores while studying  their faces.  (Afterall, a mothers' eye documents the passage of time like nothing else.)  As I make the mental progression from infant to preteen, I feel awed in their presence.  They think that as a parent, I wield the ultimate control over them. 

What they don't realize is that in the love I have for them, they are the ones that have the control.

Therein lies the problem with love, I think.  It's hard to give up a piece of yourself, along with the realization that in doing so, you are losing a little bit of control.  That the object of your love will always have a degree of power over you.  A scary proposition, with little or no guarantees.

Give in to it, I say.  Fighting it  will only accomplish making you feel worse...well, maybe you're into that kind of  thing.

Anyway.

I know that there are cynics out there who will scoff at me, who will happily tell me that I'm out of my mind.  Gleefully point out that love sucks, and why bother?  All that agony.  All that destruction.  Hey, you are entitled to your own opinion.  And you have my sympathies as to what made you foster it.

But as for me, I believe.