Love Is...

You're sweet like I can't deny
You say it to me and you only use your eyes
So come here don't move
I've got a lot heart growing heavier for you

The sparks in your touch
I'm playing with fire
You're never too much that I am entirely in
Love is the worst you can't explain
But once you feel it inside you're not the same
I climbed so high that I can't find the air

Steve Moakler
True Like Your Name


Do you remember where you were when the moment last struck you? That splinter of time when clarity and confusion blur into one. Calmness is jolted by loss of breath and vision loses depth. The back of the neck forces fear from every pore and a ripple runs through the exterior causing every hair to dance. Nausea explodes from the gut to the brain and back again. The entire body is shuddered at every beat until muteness agitates the ears. Acceptance scares fear then smothers agitation with assurance.

In the beginning, even before it starts there is a flash of too many emotions that cause anarchy in the brain. It might be the first time you ever speak to her or the monumental first ‘I love you’ when it seems like eternity waiting for a response. Anxiety releases adrenaline into the blood stream and sometimes those are the sweetest fractions of time.

I wonder about her demeanor after a long day at work, the expression that lights her face in a moment of joy, the color of her aura during a passionate kiss. I imagine the feelings of doing my laundry and finding one of her hairs entangled in a shirt as if clinging onto me while she is not in my presence. I daydream of rolling over and smelling her on my pillow case and knowing she was previously lying right beside me. I try to picture watching a movie together. Does she like to cuddle if the movie is sad or scary? Does she leave her underwear and toothbrush out? Would she enjoy drinking wine and conversing as I prepared a homemade meal for her?

Being true to my Gemini nature I question whether I believe in love anymore. After all, what is love? Is your definition of it the same as others'? Can you see it or hold it? Do we not consider love the physical or emotional act? Is it similar to a record where you own a physical container of music but never actually hold the songs? Is love not faith, trust and emotions? But to me that seems only our own physical interpretation of what we think love is.

Webster's defines it, movies portray it and songs cry out for it. So much time, money and effort devoted to love seems to be a manifestation of desire yet it still remains intangible. There exists an overabundance of dedicated and faithful followers for something we can never truly have. Is love something you can't live without or is it worth fighting or dying for?

Is love comparable to the human body's need of water and air or is it an unnecessary luxury such as a chocolate truffle? So while I dream about relationship bliss and the woman to share that with, I have to ask myself if what society is selling is a want or a need. No matter what, our individual definition of love must be defined before we truly understand what it is that we are yearning for. Whether real or mythical, supply tells us that there is enough for everyone if we demand that we find it.


by Trey Mitchell

I Fall In Love All The Time

Love
· Pronunciation: \ˈləv\
· Function: noun
· Etymology: Middle English, from Old English lufu
· a strong positive emotion of regard and affection
· any object of warm affection or devotion or admiration
· have a great affection or liking for
· used as terms of endearment
· get pleasure from
· a deep feeling of sexual desire and attraction


I fall in love all the time…in my head.

I know better to let my heart get involved. It is a long uphill climb on a slippery slope. When I ask myself what I want in a woman it is easier to answer what I don’t want. I have had what I don’t want. After all these years of long dead end roads, I could easily feel nothing. Yet I still have a romantic hidden inside, curled up naked protecting that dream of love.

When I was younger I believed in ‘movie love’. Now that I am older and have experienced many attempts to discover that elusive love, I know that it does not exist. Although, I do believe in a realistic form of it is possible to achieve.

Do you remember young love in high school when you never wanted that last goodnight kiss to end? When you could talk on the phone for hours about anything and nothing at all? To get a love note was such a personal rush and to finally declare that you were ‘going with’ someone was a monumental thrill!

In adult form, these situations of emotional bliss still prevail. To get an unexpected text, email or voice mail ‘just to say hello’ is just as invigorating as finding that three cent prize in the bottom of that caramel coated popcorn. And that was when you were already I on a sugar high!

So often it is the little things that mean so much. Let's say you are out of town and you stop at a little country store or even a truck stop and you buy some cheap little trinket to give her upon your return. It makes her laugh and she knows that you were thinking of her. Or maybe you are meeting new people and you have a great conversation you can’t wait to tell her about later. The last thing you want to hear is her voice before you go to sleep. And I could go on...

It surprises even me that I am missing things that I have only been privileged enough to have a glimpse of. I must believe in real love or I have nothing to hope for. Does wishing for more money, a better job, a new car or a big house really bring happiness? When you are dying will you be telling stories on your death bed about that one summer in your mid thirties when you and your convertible Mercedes spent so much time cruising with the top down blaring ‘your song’? I don’t think so.

One of my new favorite quotes is “Life is not measured by the breaths we take but the moments that take our breath away.” Is it so wrong to want to share irreversible and irreplaceable moments in time with someone so special that you can’t imagine your life without them?

I know that there are beautiful, intelligent, genuine women with a great sense of humor that at the same time have self-worth, come from good families and want but don't need to be in a relationship. I have met a few. Unfortunately, someone had already shown them how amazing they are by expressing respect and love for them.

I know some men relish in the idea of living the endless bachelor life of only responsibility for them. I wonder if the quick fix of the next woman they conquer is not just as much an addiction. Just as the aging rocker uses drugs and sex to constantly relive up the high of the adoration of thousands of people he doesn’t even know. Isn’t the short intense rush of cotton candy nothing in comparison to a full meal that satisfies you for much longer?

When most of us were younger we had little knowledge and no fear. I hardly knew that the word consequence existed. In my mind, there was no failure and certainly no pain. Thinking usually occurred after the action. As we get older what were simple decisions are now convoluted with more choices and most often even larger consequences for our actions.

From experience, I know that giving everything to the wrong person is worse than giving to no one at all. I think to be not alone, but with you is one of the most beneficial and courageous things we can do. I know in the end I just need to start with the basics...to be with someone that accepts me as I am and vice versa.

It sure has seemed like a ghost hunt thus far...but maybe I am starting to believe in ghosts.

By Trey Mitchell