Love is.

That's right, friends. I have broken my 3 month (?!) blog drought in order to make it evident to the interwebs that I am indeed in love. Like, for reals.

I'm shamelessly admitting now that I hadn't a clue what being in love meant before. And subsequently admitting that I have become one of those obnoxious people who says crap like "I hadn't a clue what being in love meant before."

This doesn't cancel out, or erase, any feelings for anyone I've had in the past. Not a single sweet moment, not one screaming fight or angry text message. The past is there, it happened, and there were many strong feelings involved. But with experience (and, just maybe, maturity?) has come new insight, and I can't accurately identify those feelings as LOVE.

Let's explore that word a bit. According to dictionary.com, Love is:

1. a profoundly tender, passionate affection for another person.
2. a feeling of warm personal attachment or deep affection, as for a parent, child, or friend.
3. sexual passion or desire.
4. a person toward whom love is felt; beloved person; sweetheart.
5. (used in direct address as a term of endearment, affection, or the like): Would you like to see a movie, love?
6. a love affair; an intensely amorous incident; amour.
7. sexual intercourse; copulation.
8. ( initial capital letter ) a personification of sexual affection, as Eros or Cupid.
9. affectionate concern for the well-being of others: the love of one's neighbor.
10. strong predilection, enthusiasm, or liking for anything: her love of books.
11. the object or thing so liked: The theater was her great love.
12. the benevolent affection of god for His creatures, or the reverent affection due from them to God.
13. Chiefly Tennis . a score of zero; nothing.
14. a word formerly used in communications to represent the letter L.

...Huh. So you can, I suppose, understand my confusion. See especially definitions 1,3,6, and 7. Especially 7, ahem. With 14 existing ways in our language to define this word, Love,one of which involves TENNIS, it isn't really a surprise that it's so misused and misunderstood.

Let's try another definition. According to the Bible:

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails." - 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

That makes it so much clearer, no? The question, I guess, was never what love IS, but what love DOES. I never once asked myself before if any of the above was true of the person claiming to love me. Could I substitute his name for "Love" in the above verses and find those statements to be true the majority of the time? No. And it wouldn't have been true of me, either.

But the crazy thing is, I can do that now. Not because he's perfect, he isn't. Not because I'm just THAT easy to love...I'm not. He is all of these things to me because he LOVES ME. It's not us inherently being patient, or kind, or selfless, or forgiving that allows us to love. It is love itself that allows us to be patient, kind, selfless, and forgiving. And that alone is so worth all of the times our being human lets us screw it up. It's a brand-new feeling when "I love you" means more than "Until you start to irritate me."

Anyway, thought it was about time I updated on the status change in the cheesiest way possible. With any luck I'll post again before 90 days is up.