Tag Archives: in love

The Courage to Love

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Maybe I am a foolish dreamer but I believe love – real love – is very likely the greatest gift life offers us. I think if you are afforded the possibility of real romantic love you are, well, a fool if you allow things like a single tattoo (which I don’t have) or facial hair (which I do have) to be deal breakers. You are equally foolish if you let the size of a woman’s breasts or the length of her legs guide your decision making.

It seems to me many have a plethora of reasons, some conscious, some not so conscious, for avoiding real love. What is his or her schooling? Have they been to college? What did his or her parents do for a living? She or he has a child already? He or she has been married before? She or he is five feet tall? Six feet tall?

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the human species is ineffably gifted at coming up with reasons to avoid real love. I remember many years ago going out with a woman for a brief time. We liked each other and all was going well and one evening over dinner she said, I’ve been meaning to ask, what sign are you? Not seeing the bear trap on the ground in front of me, I said, Libra. A look of unutterable horror came over her face. Oh Peter, she said, in a tone so troubled you’d have thought every one she knew just died, We don’t get along. Instantly realizing I was facing a mountain that called for oxygen tanks to summit, I said, What the hell we been doing up to now? She shook her head, put her fork down on the table and said, I should go. I agreed. She left. I finished my meal.

Now I know there are underlying reasons for why we run from or avoid the possibility of love. Nearly always these reasons are found in the soil of our histories. We’ve been wounded before, we’ve been betrayed before. We’ve turned our hearts loose before only to have them gutted. In some instances we were raised in ways that taught us we weren’t much worth loving. So, if you find yourself falling in love, or faced with the possibility of falling in love and being loved, just think, if you run, your history wins – again. Your history does not deserve that kind of decision making power. You do.

Relationship Jail Cells

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Many years ago I wrote a script that went nowhere called It Was Your Heart I Wanted. The story was about a woman confronted with the possibility of entering a relationship but found herself fearfully hesitant because her last relationship had been such a brutal one. An all too common reason for hesitancy many have when facing the possibility of new love. And so, in a very real way, they are trapped in the jail cells of prior relationships. I called the piece It Was Your Heart I Wanted because I do believe most of us can say that and mean that when we enter into a relationship.

But there is another kind of relationship jail cell. The relationship we are are already in, we know are not happy, and yet we stay in them anyway. The love may be gone, if it was ever there, and the environment is toxic, but we stay. Blessedly, I am not in this situation and after nearly seven years of sobriety would disengage from a situation like this were I in one. But, believe me, I’ve been in toxic relationship jail cells before.

I know a few people who are in them now.

I know one extraordinary person who is an American History buff. I mean this is someone who really knows and loves American History. But their spouse stops them from any involvement with history clubs or other people who love history. I know another person who is in a relationship with someone they like but don’t love but figures the person is good to the kids so why not.

I level no harsh judgment towards anyone who is trapped by their history in a way that stops them from daring to love and daring to be loved. What I will say is this. All of us have the right to love and be loved, and no one’s history deserves so much say it stops them from experiencing the heart-and-soul wonder of a relationship that works gloriously, and believe me, there are relationships like this in the world. I know people who are in them.

I don’t know about you, but I think I’ll take the risk of loving and being loved. My history be damned. If the possibility of a deep-in-the-heart relationship is there, I don’t want to miss it, at least not because of my history.

DON’T FORGET TO SAY I LOVE YOU

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Don’t forget to say I love you. That is something events like the tragic crane collapse in Manhattan this week reminds us. Two young men, their lives rich with life, were killed: Donald Leo, a 30-year-old crane operator who was going to get married this June 21, and Ramadan Kurtaj, a 27-year-old émigré from Kosovo. The New York Times reports that in addition to fighting for his life in Kosovo, Kurtaj “worked long hours on water and sewer lines so that he could send money home to his parents.”

When I read these stories my body stills, tears wet my eyes, and my heart breaks for those close to the loss. I remember a poignant note sent by a former Yankee catcher to a Yankee manager the day 32-year-old Yankee captain Thurman Munson was buried. Munson was killed when a plane he was flying crashed in Canton, Ohio on August 2, 1979.

The first game the Yankees played after Munson’s death was in Yankee Stadium against the Baltimore Orioles. The Orioles catcher was Rick Dempsey, a former Yankee and back-up catcher for Munson. The Yankee manager was Billy Martin. Dempsey wrote a note to Martin. In it he told Martin that he, like so many, loved Thurman and he, like so many of us, didn’t always remember to tell people he loved that he loved them. And so, in this note, he told Martin that he loved him.

Life, with all its bumps and bruises, is a beautiful thing. Sometimes the bumps and bruises part can rent so much space in our heads that we forget to notice the beautiful things, the wonderous things, the people in our lives that we love and who love us. So next time you’re talking with someone you love, don’t forget to tell them. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think there is any such thing as telling someone you love them too many times. Have you ever asked anyone to stop telling you?

REAL LOVE: AND SO IT GOES

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I love the idea of long walks, of holding hands, of leaning on each others shoulder, in play, and in tenderness. I love the idea of sitting quietly together, listening to music, laughing in-the-belly-hard at some comedy routine, or holding each other close if one or the other or both have been wounded in life. I think two people ought to draw close, not apart, when the road gets rocky. All these things are so deep-in-the-heart-and-soul important to me when it comes to the question of real love. And if I can’t answer this question honestly when I ask it of myself, how can I possibly answer it if I am asked by a woman?

And so it goes.