Love. . .

Love. What a word. How many different meanings can we attach to one simple four letter word? “I LOVE you! I love you. I LOVE you.” It is a word that, admittedly, I say all too frequently. However, it is a word that I feel is said way too little. I should not describe things as items I love . However, I would rather tell one too many that I love them than have someone go through life never knowing that I cared about them. Cared about how they felt. Cared about what was going on in their world. Cared about what they found important. Cared that they were in this world with me.

I have a wonderful book of poetry by my favorite poet – Jovan – in which a poem begins,

“Which is worse, saying something and wishing you hadn’t or saying nothing and wishing you had”

I know for me, it is saying nothing. I frequently open my mouth before I’ve put a lot of thought into what is coming out of my mouth. I can and have had to apologize for that. I am sincerely apologetic if my words have hurt someone unintentionally. And sometimes, I’ve even been blessed enough to be forgiven when my words have hurt someone...But it’s those times, those rare times when I have said nothing, when I have not let the words escape my lips, when I have bitten down on my tongue to keep from letting it wag, those times when I have almost choked myself to keep from speaking that I regret the most. I would rather say I love you to a million a million times than regret not saying it to one, just one time.

So, maybe I say it too often, and maybe I shouldn’t use it to describe how much I really like something...and unfortunately, maybe that means someone won’t believe me when I say “I love you” or maybe they won’t know the depth of my true feelings because they think I use the word too often, but maybe, just maybe – it will make the difference to just one person.