What's love...?
A secondhand emotion, according to the immortal Tina Turner.
But to many Romance authors?
It's everything.
My friend and co-author of the upcoming Johan's Quest series, Brita Addams, gave me some thoughts on the subject. See, to her, love is truly everything. She's lived it, felt it, breathes it in each day. Whereas, I tend to lean more toward Tina Turner's take on it, for love--romantic love--remains but a dream... a hope in my life. But then if we were all cut from the same mold and lived similar lives... how boring would this world be, right?
Love is defined as many things by many people. There's the grandiose hearts and flowers, wine and expensive trips. That works to acquire love, maybe, but to keep it, well, that takes something more.
Brita says:
I prefer to accept a more conventional explanation--the all-important emotion that seems to make the world go round. As romance authors, we write about it in glowing terms: commitment, a lifelong need that burns in all of us.
To me, love is that understanding that there is someone in the world who knows me and cares for me anyway. Whoever I am today, I'm accepted and I live in someone else's thoughts. Love is that one person who's by my side when the chips are down, slogging it out, whatever the adversity. It's caring for someone more than you care for yourself, because you know they feel the exact same way.
It's getting down to the end of your life and knowing you've lived a life that touched others and that touch had an impact. You meant the world to someone else, you were their world, the reason they got up in the morning.
Bryl says:
The above rendition of LOVE is exactly how Brita has managed to gain my attention, worm her way into my heart, and earn my trust, which I do not offer freely. Personally, I have no clue how to define love. Even after thinking on it an entire day, I came up at a loss for words.
The closest I think I come to knowing love is that protectiveness that overcomes me when someone hurts anyone I care about. Or maybe it's that smile that crosses my face when others would cringe from walking in on Sugar Daddy making a complete ass of himself.
Seeing my dismay, understanding my struggle, Brita went on to further try and explain, and in doing so by painting such an apt picture, finally helped me to understand:
How many funerals have you attended where people stood up and spoke about the deceased? I've attended many and the one common thread through all of them is striking. Never, has anyone ever said "Oh, what a wonderful carpenter he was," or "What a wonderful nurse she was." Instead, the folks who stand to speak, do so with tears, their sense of loss deep and heartfelt. The words they speak are of the importance of the deceased's life, the impact that person had on those who loved them.
The answer to the question, "What's Love Got to do With It?" I'm sure the answer is different for everyone, but my answer is Love has everything to do with it. Without love, a person's life is empty. Love is all that makes things worthwhile, all that, when things are said and done, is most enduring.
So, now that I've been laid bare, you tell me,
What does love mean to you?
Leave a comment today and be entered in a drawing to win one Love Revisited: Rye and Chal Tee or a pdf copy of today's release.
Bryl R. Tyne is a wrangler by nature and a writer by choice, published with Noble Romance Publishing, Ravenous Romance, Dreamspinner Press, STARbooks Press, Untreed Reads Publishing, Changeling Press, and Amber Quill Press. Check out Bryl's bi-monthly column: My Way Find out more about the author at: bryltyne.com
7 comments:
Well, Bryl, as you and I have often discussed, we come from similar sides of the tracks. I, too, think that love for me and mine is most often felt in the form of going to the mat for them, standing next to them in good times and bad. That ferocious protectiveness comes in handy when the world looks like a cement chute and you're the waiting slab. Eyes wide open is kinda how I live my life. I'm okay with that. If you're not, change.
I used to think love had to be a wild ride, a rollercoaster -- if I wasn't totally absorbed, it wasn't love. Then I learned real love -- while it might contain the carnival ride at times -- was actually something peaceful and uplifting. It's knowing you have a connection that stretches to the end of the earth without breaking as John Donne puts it in his immortal poem, "Valediction: Forbidding Mourning." The ideal I'm still trying to learn: unselfish love. Loving without any expectation of return, loving freely and generously, even (especially!) when someone cannot return it.
At first, love is that stay up all night and go to work the next day looking forward to staying up all night emotion. But eventually you're going to notice the one you love eats cereal with his or her mouth open, doesn't like all the TV shows or books you like, and really does need to shave every day, though he or she believes in giving the razor a few days off now and then. That's when real love rises or falls.
Real love is beyond the wrapping paper. It's in the heart, and in the soul.
When milk dribbles down a chin, it's remembering that chin would step in front of a bus for you, go without food so you had enough to eat, and stay by your side no matter what sacrifices had to be made to do so.
And love is knowing you would do the same in return.
David, you made me tear up, really. Love isn't always the hearts and flowers, but it is as you describe, the everyday stuff. I love the way you put it, it's lovely.
C. Margery - unselfish love for humans I think is almost a paradox, but we can strive for it. After so many years with my husband, I still think I get the best side of it, but he claims HE does, so I think we're going alright.
Margie - going to the mat for those you love - yes indeed.
Love has many faces - I'm just glad it decided to shine on me.
Love is defined just as much by the little things as it is the big ones. Whether it's ignoring the fact that your lover uses "like" fifty times in a single sentence or being willing to kill or die for them if necessary, love is never just one thing. It's comprised of an entire farrago of tolerance, compromise, shared experience, desire, and emotional connection. The hearts will tear and the flowers will eventually wilt under the stresses of day-to-day life, but true love is found with the person who will stand with you through all of it. They'll still love you no matter how rocky the road gets and offer you hope for a better, brighter day.
It doesn't always make sense...but who said it had to? We're a wacky race with some wacky proclivities; we're like the Looney Tunes of nature. As long as we have love, though, we'll be okay.
I wanted to comment with a huge definition but feel so inept. What love means to me is hypocritical in the sense it is hard and soft, sweet and sour, etc.. I write about love, but defining it is in each moment and I'm much better defining as the moment comes...if that makes sense to anyone but me. LOL
What an awesome post. You both made me smile and nod, able to relate to your discussion in that deep, soul-touching way.
Thank you.
Best,
AyVee
Allure Van Sanz
Hi there, just letting you know that I have nominated you for the One Lovely Blog Award. Just pop over to my blog and you can collect it from there.
Vampirique Dezire
http://vampiriquedezire.blogspot.com
Post a Comment