The "L" Word (Part 1)
If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more.
-Jane Austen
It's funny. I was perusing my old posts from my Blogger dashboard and I came across this one, a draft that I started over two years ago and never finished. While the purpose behind it is now obsolete, it's a topic that has come up more and more in recent days -- one I was even intending to post on -- so I thought I might try my hand at finishing it.
I come from a loving family, no doubt. We don't yell (although at times perhaps we should), we spend time together whenever we get the chance, our road trips are hilarious fun, and we're even known to have long conversations at the dinner table. For many years, the phrase "I love you" really wasn't heard, but (most of the time) it didn't seem necessary. It was fact, and fact did not need to be spoken. Things happened, life changed, and now those words do come out a bit more often, but they are rarely said lightly and never taken so.
A lasting effect of this upbringing is a comparable inability to speak my feelings about things, especially where people are concerned (particularly when those feelings are favorable). I can talk events, books, movies, religion, and select opinions with a fair amount of ease, but ask me about my feelings and I get flustered. Instead, I tend to cover with humor or sarcasm, and I often say that you can tell if I like you by how much violence is directed toward you. (This is a mild exaggeration. There are plenty of people that I like that I have never kicked. But if I don't like you, I will avoid physical contact as much as I possibly can.)
The bottom line is -- I still don't talk about love. Much. I suppose you could say I'm learning. This post is something of an attempt to fight the urge to stay silent and/or sarcastic. Bear with me -- it's a long one.
The other lasting effect of my upbringing -- more specifically, of the attitudes and behaviors of my parents -- is an almost complete disregard for romance, at least by today's standards.
However, the only way you can even begin to understand my outlook is to understand the influences in my life.
As such, I am going to tell you a few stories before I get into my own thoughts. These are other people's stories, but they are some of my favorites. Okay? Here we go.
My Parents
My parents started dating on a set-up; basically, my mom's best friend was my dad's cousin, and she (the cousin) wasn't allowed to see the guy she was seeing. So Mom and the friend/cousin went to the fair together, while Dad and Unapproved Boyfriend went together. Once there, they all met up and my parents were abandoned. Lucky for me.
Ten months later, Mom and Dad were out on a sort-of picnic lunch. The time: June, 1976. The place: Dinosaur Park in Rapid City. (Yeah, you heard me.) My parents were eating at the picnic tables there when a wedding processional went by.
At this point, my dad turned to my mom.
"We should do that."
"You wouldn't dare."
"Let's go buy rings."
Eleven months later, they were married. Now, 31 years later, they've got three kids -- 17, 22, and 24 -- and have owned three houses, six cats, one dog, and about a dozen vehicles. They have been through thick and thin, starting with a motorcycle accident that nearly took my dad's life only four weeks after they got married. They've been through several jobs each and my dad's return to school. They made it past the seven-year-itch, the 14-year-itch, the 23-year hump, the 29-year-stretch, and the whole of the '90s. And they are both only barely fifty.
They have attended track meets, basketball games, volleyball games, band concerts, vocal concerts, Boy Scout meetings, and -- I actually did the math and this is no exaggeration -- over eight hundred soccer games. At no point in my life have I had reason to doubt that they loved each of us -- or, possibly more importantly, each other.
My parents are my heroes.
My dad tells me that he had a pretty good idea about two months in that this was the girl he would marry. (Impressive, considering he was only nineteen when they started dating.) My mom's mom even told her to be careful just a month or two after they started dating, because "this boy is serious about you." They've had their share of random romance (their 25th anniversary is quite a story) but for the most part my parents seem more like a team than a couple -- that is, except for the times that one of us kids happens upon them making out in the kitchen. When I was little that was a surefire way to send me scurrying off to bed, no matter how adamant I had been about staying up later.
It is this upbringing that has inspired much of the mindset I now have on romance and marriage.
[My mother just cringed. "Oh no ... She's never going to get married."]
Lucky for her sanity, though, they aren't the only influences in my life ...
-Jane Austen
It's funny. I was perusing my old posts from my Blogger dashboard and I came across this one, a draft that I started over two years ago and never finished. While the purpose behind it is now obsolete, it's a topic that has come up more and more in recent days -- one I was even intending to post on -- so I thought I might try my hand at finishing it.
I come from a loving family, no doubt. We don't yell (although at times perhaps we should), we spend time together whenever we get the chance, our road trips are hilarious fun, and we're even known to have long conversations at the dinner table. For many years, the phrase "I love you" really wasn't heard, but (most of the time) it didn't seem necessary. It was fact, and fact did not need to be spoken. Things happened, life changed, and now those words do come out a bit more often, but they are rarely said lightly and never taken so.
A lasting effect of this upbringing is a comparable inability to speak my feelings about things, especially where people are concerned (particularly when those feelings are favorable). I can talk events, books, movies, religion, and select opinions with a fair amount of ease, but ask me about my feelings and I get flustered. Instead, I tend to cover with humor or sarcasm, and I often say that you can tell if I like you by how much violence is directed toward you. (This is a mild exaggeration. There are plenty of people that I like that I have never kicked. But if I don't like you, I will avoid physical contact as much as I possibly can.)
The bottom line is -- I still don't talk about love. Much. I suppose you could say I'm learning. This post is something of an attempt to fight the urge to stay silent and/or sarcastic. Bear with me -- it's a long one.
The other lasting effect of my upbringing -- more specifically, of the attitudes and behaviors of my parents -- is an almost complete disregard for romance, at least by today's standards.
However, the only way you can even begin to understand my outlook is to understand the influences in my life.
As such, I am going to tell you a few stories before I get into my own thoughts. These are other people's stories, but they are some of my favorites. Okay? Here we go.
My Parents
My parents started dating on a set-up; basically, my mom's best friend was my dad's cousin, and she (the cousin) wasn't allowed to see the guy she was seeing. So Mom and the friend/cousin went to the fair together, while Dad and Unapproved Boyfriend went together. Once there, they all met up and my parents were abandoned. Lucky for me.
Ten months later, Mom and Dad were out on a sort-of picnic lunch. The time: June, 1976. The place: Dinosaur Park in Rapid City. (Yeah, you heard me.) My parents were eating at the picnic tables there when a wedding processional went by.
At this point, my dad turned to my mom.
"We should do that."
"You wouldn't dare."
"Let's go buy rings."
Eleven months later, they were married. Now, 31 years later, they've got three kids -- 17, 22, and 24 -- and have owned three houses, six cats, one dog, and about a dozen vehicles. They have been through thick and thin, starting with a motorcycle accident that nearly took my dad's life only four weeks after they got married. They've been through several jobs each and my dad's return to school. They made it past the seven-year-itch, the 14-year-itch, the 23-year hump, the 29-year-stretch, and the whole of the '90s. And they are both only barely fifty.
They have attended track meets, basketball games, volleyball games, band concerts, vocal concerts, Boy Scout meetings, and -- I actually did the math and this is no exaggeration -- over eight hundred soccer games. At no point in my life have I had reason to doubt that they loved each of us -- or, possibly more importantly, each other.
My parents are my heroes.
My dad tells me that he had a pretty good idea about two months in that this was the girl he would marry. (Impressive, considering he was only nineteen when they started dating.) My mom's mom even told her to be careful just a month or two after they started dating, because "this boy is serious about you." They've had their share of random romance (their 25th anniversary is quite a story) but for the most part my parents seem more like a team than a couple -- that is, except for the times that one of us kids happens upon them making out in the kitchen. When I was little that was a surefire way to send me scurrying off to bed, no matter how adamant I had been about staying up later.
It is this upbringing that has inspired much of the mindset I now have on romance and marriage.
[My mother just cringed. "Oh no ... She's never going to get married."]
Lucky for her sanity, though, they aren't the only influences in my life ...
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Hubba