Still water is deepest

“I love you!”  Those precious words are carelessly bandied about like a tennis ball at a professional competition. Whack!  Like the tennis ball, it flies to the ear of the recipient so quickly, it catches them off guard and hits them between the eyes. If said badly or if the timing is not right, those words may get caught in the net and miss the mark completely.  Sometimes, those words are just said out-of-bounds.

I, personally use those words prolifically. I am one who believes, one should make their feelings known and let the important people in our lives know they are loved. I am passionate in every sense of the word. There is no “in between,” for me. If I love, I love deeply. If I’m angry, I’m bad to the bone. If it’s funny, I may laugh until I lose my breath. I suppose, with all of those qualifications,  I may have thought myself to be an expert in love, but today, the reality of the depth of those delightful, healing words staggered me speechless. (which was no small feat!) No, I am ashamed to say, it was not I, who understood the depth of those words, although I was the recipient.  In any case, the meaning should be shared.  I will impart my revelation with you if you will allow me to step out of the shallow water and accompany you into the deep.

I have been married for 46 years to a wonderful man, whom I may or may not, flush down the toilet!  He is a quiet, even-tempered man, who  is easy on the eyes. His slender build helps him look 20 years younger than his 67 years and  he is reasonably athletic. I, on the other hand, am overweight, talk incessantly. I appear to be 10 years older, at least, than my 63 years and have a tendency to be meaner than a junk yard dog.

In addition to that, a couple of years ago, I broke my foot severely.  I wear a brace on my foot. He laces it up for me each  morning  and puts my shoes and socks on me. By his own voliton, he organizes and doles  out my medicine, each morning. These rituals, though necessary, are not conducive to the atmosphere of personal  intimacy, or so I thought.

This morning,  as I sat in my wheelchair, (I don’t use it much anymore. I am a hairstylist and work full-time but when I remove my brace, I may  have need of  it.) he surprised me by bringing his cell phone with him to put on my shoes. I thought it was Elvis singing…”That’s odd,” I thought,” he doesn’t care about Elvis and he never shares music with me. That is something I ususally do with him.

He turned the volume up, bent to do the menial task before him and made eye contact with me. Whoa! (sizzle)  Then I heard, I mean really heard, the words to the song. Humbled and honored, I listened to my husband as the music played…..

Still loving you, just like before  Only now, I love you more

More every day, more every way,

Still loving you

Still wanting you, more every night. In every dream, I hold you tight

And with the dawn, my heart goes on

Still loving you

There is more to the song.

It denotes a  heart broken by separation. I’m unsure if its from death or divorce, but believe me; his heart was full, not broken. He just found a new way to convey to me, “I love you now, and will love you forever.”