THIS is love

I grew up watching the Brady Bunch (reruns). And then I moved on to Family Ties and The Cosby Show. I watched the Christmas specials with all those people gathered around Christmas trees and families together and parents holding kids in their laps and maybe even holding hands while they said grace or something around some Thanksgiving dinner table. I watched this and I thought, "This is what families do. Parents are affectionate with their children and everyone is all in harmony and parents look lovingly at their kids and everyone is happy. This is a family. This is parents-loving-children."

As I got older, I watched 16 Candles and heard about romances among seniors at my high school and heard about perfect boyfriends and pined over romantic lyrics in pop songs and I thought, "This is what a boyfriend is. This is what boyfriends do for girlfriends. Love is thinking about the person all the time and secretly sending flowers and saying the perfect thing at exactly the right moment and just when you thought he didn't like you, he liked you all along and..."

But last week, as I was walking to work, I thought about my family. I thought about breakfast on the table every morning and french toast that was cut into pieces small enough for me to eat. I thought about the bag lunch with my name on it that somehow made it to school by lunch time, even if I forgot to put it in my backpack when I left that morning. I thought about pajamas and the did-you-brush-your-teeth breath check. There was no bedtime story but there was dinner and staying up a little late because the 'specials' were on. I thought about long drives in the car and conversations that didn't have to happen, but that did.

And it occurred to me: I was loved, and I missed it. I've been loved my whole life, but I missed it because it wasn't TV love, it wasn't nuclear family love, it wasn't Meredith Baxter Birney putting her arm around you or saying I love you. I was so busy wishing that I had that kind of love that I didn't feel the love that I was given every morning when I was woken up, when I was given breakfast, when I was handed the lunch that was made for me the night before. All my life my grownup has been loving me, just because. And yet I've been searching to be loved 'just because.'
It was right there, it is right there, it's always been right there, I just wouldn't see it, because I thought love was what they showed on TV.

I was sad when I saw this, sad for the love that was given but not recevied. But then I thought that the person who was giving it wasn't giving it to get something back, they were just giving it freely, just because. And they still are, in their lovely way. And I can start to see it, to feel it, maybe connect with them around it, but most importantly to actually see it, for the love that it is.

And then I thought about the love that's all around me that I don't see either. The door held open for me, the smile in the hallway, the 'you first' in the grocery store, the compliments I don't receive. And I thought too about the love of friends, the conversations, the noticings, the truthful words that risk our harmony but are said anyway. And I thought about relatives and phone calls and parties and 'how are you?'s and food that is shared.
"I'm surrounded by love," I thought to myself. "I've just never seen it, or felt it, because I only had one view of love. All this love...everywhere...and I'm so busy looking for it somewhere else. All I have to do is see it, right in front of me, understand that this is love, all of this.  All of this, is love."