Helloooo.
I hope you are all having a good Valentine’s. I love that the interweb today is populated with posts either expressing great excitement or vast bitterness over the day. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of in-between. Well, you already know which side I’m on. This morning, I was regretting not having my camera with me, but was in too much of a rush what with the work-lateness, need for coffee and gasoline, and the giant box-o-Buddha (my ex-laptop) I was carrying. We got some of that heavy, wet snow last night, and it was beautiful. The trees were drooping with it. When I got to work, my first priority was to draw a big heart in the untouched snow in the parking lot, and take a picture with my phone. When I left for lunch, I found a minivan parked on top of my heart. Sigh. So, about this love thing. My family has never been very affectionate. They’re all very hands-off and emotions are a topic to be avoided. It’s been only within the past couple years that I’ve even recalled hearing my dad say, ‘I love you’. And that was always pretty ok with me growing up; I knew he loved us without saying it. That makes it something that stands out a lot more now. I was trying to pin down when that began. I think it may have been when my sister was so sick she almost died. As I’ve mentioned, the parents became a lot more religious then. I think it was one of those critical examinations of the important things in life, and I’m glad for that. So now I hear my dad say it fairly regularly, whenever I’m going to be away for some time or am having a particularly bad experience with something. I think it’s wonderful, this change in my dad. The thing that pains me a little is my own reaction. I still can’t get used to it. It always comes unexpected, and as natural as ‘I love you too’ should come, it doesn’t. I hesitate. Sometimes I stammer. I hate that I do that, because I don’t want him to think it makes me uncomfortable. It’s just that 30 years of training is hard to undo. I’m working on it, though. It’s not a phrase that comes easily to me; I don’t even tell my close friends I love them, even though I do. There have only been a few times in my life where it’s felt absolutely meaningful and natural to me. I couldn’t be happier that this is one of those times. Jenni