‘What’s love got to do with it? ‘

We interrupt our scheduled depressing program for a lighter piece (hopefully lol). We will resume the tear jerking after this brief message…

When I was little I remember having two ideas of what love was supposed to be. The kind my parents had, and the kind you see in Disney movies. My parents love always seemed a given, it just was the way it was. As if they didn’t actually choose each other. The universe had decided to pair my parents in order for us to exist. When I joined this world they were already a ‘we’. That’s how it would stay.

When I imagined love for myself on the other hand, it was a bouquet of Jerry Maguire, romantic dinners, hand holding, Brad Renfro (remember him? lol), and flowers. Now I call bullshit. I’m not saying flowers aren’t nice but these days I’d take Ian helping tidy over flowers any day. Every year I understand my parents relationship better. They don’t need to hold hands to feel close, they can actually be on totally different sides of the house and still feel connected. When you know someone so well that you can anticipate their needs before they even realize what they need, that is love. When you see the other side of them, the ugly side, and even if you don’t like them, you still love them, that’s love.

Ian, my partner in crime for the last 16 years is coming up on his 38th birthday. So I guess you can say that we’ve grown up together. We still are. Now we are the same as our parents. We are a unit, our children depend on us to be solid so that they can feel safe. I accept that my husband will age, that love handles will eventually come and be here to stay. I accept that he will be grumpy just because sometimes. I accept that body hair will start to sprout like a springtime garden on random places of his body. I accept that for the first hour of the morning he isn’t capable of making decisions or small talk till he’s had his tea and news review for the day. Now, why do I accept these things? Well, I too am aging, I too am moody for no good reason sometimes, and I may not be sprouting hair in random places (Gd willing) but I do have about an hour or more before the kids go to bed, which is right around the point when Ian gets home where instead of welcoming him after a long day of work with a smile I’m like a combination of Cruela de Vil, and Darth Vader. Yea, scariest shit ever.

He has proven to me time and time again that I am his soul mate. He carries me when I’m weak, he applauds me when I succeed, he trusts and respects my mothering and he makes me feel beautiful, always.

In my humble opinion, love and happiness is in big trouble these days. We have gotten to the point where we mistake love for passion, and happiness for excitement. If we don’t feel passionate about our partner then we worry that the love is disintegrating. If we aren’t having fun then we aren’t happy. I’m obviously guilty of this behavior as well; in this world of constant, instant gratification, we’ve become spoiled. Overnight shipping, texting, online grocery shopping, everything at our fingertips – no wonder why we are all a bunch of oversized toddlers when we don’t get what we want. It interferes with our relationships because we don’t have patience anymore, we don’t have to wait till our partners come home to get answers, we text. We’ve gotten so used to getting what we want that compromising has become a thing of the past. Entitlement is an acceptable emotion now.

To sum it up, I’m jealous of the relationships that our parents and grandparents were able to have with their spouses and partners, without all the distractions of the world that is now.

So, for your birthday this year my love, I’m going to bake you a cake, get dressed like ‘Leave it to Beaver’, hide our cellphones and all electronics and force you to stare into my eyes with love, lol. Happy Birthday Sugar!!

Don’t worry babe… Who am I kidding?? I’ll probably order a gift from Amazon and call it a day. 😋