A Message For One.

We all think we know love.

We love things, like cars, motorcycles, boats and planes. We love hats, shoes, shirts and comforters. We love roller coasters, video games, two-ply toilet tissue and ballpoint pens that can write in zero gravity. We love toys that light up, make noise, need batteries or require some assembly.

We love technology.

We love electricity, indoor plumbing, central air-conditioning and double-sided, high-density DVDs. We love computers, cell phones, the internet and paper clips. We love dishwashers, remote controls, robotic dogs and 5 mega pixel, auto focus, 3x-zoom digital cameras.

We love the arts.

We love music, movies, books and television. We love creating, discovering, inventing and becoming inspired. We love color, typography, design, and concepts. We love to sing badly in the shower, write wretched poetry on public bathroom stalls and tell horrible jokes in polite company.

We love activity.

We love going out, staying home, being with friends and spending time alone. We love fitting in, being different, starting a trend and standing on our own. We love engaging our senses, disconnecting from the world, becoming immersed in the moment and stepping back to observe.

We love time.

We love being young at heart as we grow wise with age. We love holidays, vacations, weekends and birthdays. We love then, and now, and our memories and dreams. We love what was, what is and what we hope will be.

But do we really know what it means to love someone?

We all use the word love so many times during the day that we might forget at times the true meaning of love. Is it fair to tell the one you profess to love that they are only as important to you as the latest hit song on the radio? Or that you love them as much as your favorite food or childhood toy?

Do you want to be loved that way?

This day, Valentines Day, should not be about cards, or gifts or candy. It should not be about getting the biggest stuffed animal or sending the most roses to your significant others office to make their officemates jealous. Do you think buying a Hallmark card and a dozen roses will really win someone’s everlasting affection? Do you truly believe that those things, those silly, quickly discarded physical things really matter? Is that all love is to you?

That is not love to me.

Love to me is a smile that makes you want to break out in song and dance. Love is waking up next to someone and lying there, trying not to disturb their sleep, just so you can listen to their breathing for a little while longer. Love is feeling safe and warm just by hearing a voice on the phone. Love is doing what’s best for someone else, even when it’s not best for you. Love is sacrifice. Love is bliss. Love is power. Love is pain. Love is heaven. Love is hell.

Love is everything.

My girlfriend means more to me than I can ever fully express to anyone, either in words or actions. I try day and night to show her how much she means to me, but if I lived a thousand lifetimes I would remain unable to fully express my devotion to her. After days of searching for some other way to show her my feelings, I have come back to the only way I know of that might come close to expressing how I feel. What I am going to say is an overused, commercialized, and pathetically unoriginal phrase, but I can only hope and pray she will somehow grasp a small, tiny fraction of the sentiment behind the words. I say it here on my website for the whole world to see only because I say it so often when I’m with her that hearing the words from my lips might not be taken seriously anymore. When she reads this, I want her to understand that I know the meaning of the words and the weight they carry. I want her to understand that it is not this silly holiday or peer pressure forcing words from reluctant lips. I know exactly what I’m saying, and it comes from my very soul and with all my heart when I say;

Honey, I love you.