What is love

 

Everyone needs love in some form in some way. 

Taking away the one person that someone associates with love and failing to replace it with another love interest is a deadly thing to do. It is why couples die within minutes or weeks of each other after a long marriage, It is why babies fail to thrive in orphanages that look clean and safe and neat. It is why people in nursing homes wither away.

Living creatures are hard wired to need love.

It can come in the form of children, or grandchildren, spouses or friends, even pets, or it can be more creative and come from books, movies, even an imagination. The more creative you are the more likely you are to find solutions to your own problems.

Of course the more creative you are, the more sensitive you may tend to be and sometimes sensitive people simply cannot bear the weight of this world any longer, so they want to check out. People understand that and give them teddy bears and acrylic paints and phone calls every day.

When what they need is someone to watch TV with. Someone to bounce ideas off of. Someone who understands that being loved and feeling loved are not quite the same thing. A million faceless people may love with all their hearts and all their souls, but if the beloved does not feel that it is like pouring sweet tea out the window of a moving car. Feeling loved saves lives every day, but giving that kind of love is an art form balanced between really caring and taking the time to show it in a way the beloved needs to feel it. Very few people understand that.

It doesn't mean you want to get married or make mad passionate love, although it could. It means knowing the right way to touch someone, so those empty spaces don't grow and devour all the rest. It is keeping loneliness at bay in ways that matter. 

Just because you love cookies does not mean everyone loves cookies. Give cookies to someone who loves words and they will be grateful. They will understand your kindness and your need to give, but they won't feel it.  To feel it they need something they value the way you value cookies.

My Muse seems to understand all this. We have never held hands or gazed into each other's eyes. He is busy and has a life above and beyond mine, but somehow he understands what I need and is willing to give that to me in ways I barely understand, but feel.

That is love.