Presies!

Short and sweet story for you today; it made me smile anyway.

I was working at the coffee house this morning, not totally thrilled to be working, but I was hanging in there. In walks this cute old man. I have a thing for old men- they are so sweet, usually in stylish old man attire and filled with random bits of wisdom. I just eat it up. Anyway, he ordered his coffee and out of his old book, peaked a new page of stamps. I also have a thing for stamps, I love going onto the USPS website and ordering cool stamps because that just tops off a hand-written letter, making it THE coolest thing, sure to bring a smile to the recipient's face. I commented on his new stamps and my love of stamps and how cool his were. We shared our love of stamps and talked about whether it was the year of the dragon or not while we poured his coffee. He went and sat down to his table of envelopes and letters and wrote away. A little while later as he was packing up his belongings and stamped envelopes, he walks over to me and holds one stamp out to me with a big smile and says "for you!" I smiled big and questioned, "for me? really??" and he smiles even bigger and says "presies!" I probably smiled as big as I could because this cute old man was giving me one of his cool stamps AND just said the word "presies" (short for the word presents, if you're late to the word shortening game).

Oh my goodness. He made my day.

Folks, it's the little things.

to persist in love

"And when you get down to it, Lily,

that is the only purpose grand enough for a human life.

Not just to love but to persist in love."

Could there be any truer words?

I think about this a lot. And given that it's Valentine's Day, I thought I'd write some thoughts on love. As I hear story after story of love lost or just plain given up on, I can't help but find myself heartbroken over and over again. Once that feeling of "in-loveness" is gone (and it will come and go as all feelings do) relationships are just left behind and it makes me so sad. I was talking with my best friend (of 25 years- nobigdeal) over wine last night and we talked about how one can make that feeling last, how to keep the intensity and passion. I thought for a moment that of course it can last but I only let the idealist in me believe that for a fraction of a second. Of course that intensity of "in-loveness" can't last. We'd all be crazy fools in love, surviving on 10 cups of coffee a day and bumping into things and day dreaming all day. It would be crazy to think one could sustain that intensity of feeling and emotion (any emotion for that matter) for the entirety of their lives. Ha, I mean we would never get anything done. All of our other relationships and work would suffer and we'd never sleep a wink. Just because that "in-loveness" goes away or comes and goes in waves does not mean that love is gone. Love can be very much alive and strong but in a quieter deeper sense of the word. A love rooted not just in feeling, but in trust and commitment, grace and forgiveness.

That's when choosing to persist in love comes in. When we make the decision to love not just because we feel like loving someone or because we feel especially loved in that moment, but continuing to love when it's hard to and in moments when that feeling of "in-loveness" isn't felt.

We should all strive to love, to be in love and to persist in love.

And always, always, always be grateful for it.