Love, Actually Can Surprise You

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When we moved into our new home last month, my daughter Kate (15) promptly centered her bed on the wall, begged Jeremy to center her wall art above the bed, and then proceeded to meticulously decorate and organize the rest of her room accordingly. Then, about two weeks later, she decided she didn't want the bed in the center of the room after all, she preferred it tucked into the corner. It's her room, she can do whatever she wants, but the net result is that the room's aesthetic now suggests that the person who decorated it is blind.

Shortly after Kate made these changes, Jeremy inexplicably took to moving Kate's bed to different corners of her room every single time he passes by. Whether it is nine in the morning, or nine at night, Jeremy will sneak in, and rearrange her bed in another weird location: blocking the closet, diagonal in center of the room, or obstructing her desk. When Kate returns to her room and finds her bed moved away from the corner, shrieks and hysteria ensue. Rinse, repeat. 

I think we can all agree that it's best if I don't get involved. It's kind of a Dian Fossey situation where I sit back and watch the gorillas interact in surprising ways. I don't ask Jeremy why he persists in moving Kate's bed each day, in fact Kate doesn't really ask either, she just hollers at him while she shoves her bed back into place. 

Those two have a strong, strange history of affectionate teasing. Years ago, when Kate was still a little girl, she cut out a picture of Robert Pattinson from Twilight (Jeremy's least favorite movie in the United States of America) and left it on his pillow. This picture showed up a week later in Kate's sock drawer, then in Jeremy's work briefcase, and once taped up in the shower. The back and forth of the dog eared cut out continued for months. On the surface, these are harmless games. But of course it's more than that too. Kate and Jeremy are the least likely members of our family to talk about their tender feelings. Kate won't even let us hug her, because "hugs are gross." But they are both equally committed to the ritual of moving furniture, or passing a vampire photo back and forth. Interesting.

In graduate school I remember reading and studying how different social groups express affection. The currency they use to communicate feelings. Gary Chapman's popular book "The Five Love Languages" boils it down to broad categories, but I'm more interested in the individual examples. The furniture moving and vampire cut outs. This week I observed surprising, tender, and sometimes weird expressions of love happening all throughout our household. Like the daughter who rushed through her chores so she could proudly report that she didn't have to be asked to do them, and then later patiently waited to take her shower to save the hot water so mom could take a bubble bath. One of my teenage daughters stayed up until the wee hours designing elaborate, custom Valentines for each family member, including heartfelt, individual messages written inside. We're on our 87th snowstorm here in Chicago this month, and my husband has cleaned the snow off my car at least eight times this week, including this morning. The windchill is negative seventeen today. Finally, even as I've been writing this, my son climbed under my covers next to me to snuggle and read his book. Now that, Mr. Chapman, is my love language.

For me it takes both intention and habit to notice the nearly invisible, yet surprising instances of love that are happening all around me. To quote Hugh Grant's immortal words at the beginning of the movie Love, Actually: 

"Whenever I get gloomy with the state of the world, I think about the arrivals gate at Heathrow Airport. General opinion's starting to make out that we live in a world of hatred and greed, but I don't see that. It seems to me that love is everywhere. Often it's not particularly dignified or newsworthy, but it's always there - fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, boyfriends, girlfriends, old friends. When the planes hit the Twin Towers, as far as I know none of the phone calls from the people on board were messages of hate or revenge - they were all messages of love. If you look for it, I've got a sneaky feeling you'll find that love actually is all around."