Love

What comes to mind when I say the word love?

Romantic candlelit dinner dates. A quick getaway to a beautiful hill station town. Movie outings. Conversations on the phone all through the night. Gifts, flowers, a few roses here and there. Some song dedications. A beautiful wedding. Honeymoon at an exotic location. Maybe a stolen kiss or two.

Sounds about right?

Well, while all these do stand for gestures of love, they don’t even scratch the surface of it.

Love is the one encompassing emotion of all. Every other emotion you feel is either one form of love or in some way a result of it. It has layers just like an onion. Not a great analogy, I accept, but give it a chance.

So, yes, love has more layers than one, more than you know. You just keep discovering the various facets as you peel through it gradually. Some striking while some hidden and reclusive. Some loudly proclaiming their presence while some preferring a seat at the background.

The most beautiful thing about love for me is how seamlessly it assumes different forms. Through gestures really. Sometimes not even coming to the forefront. Yes, just remaining satisfied with being a shadow, basking in the glow of someone else’s joy, success and just their safe life in general.

Love like air is always there, indispensable and there but not visible all the time. But still present and if you stop to acknowledge it, you can feel it too.

Oh the shades of love!

It is nothing but that..

When you don’t forget to tell them to drive safe every time they are going somewhere.

In stolen glances which say it all when you are surrounded by family. A glance that says more than words sometimes. Thoughts in sync, to be precise.

When you don’t even remember about your own progress or failures but theirs, just filled with joy at the success of the one you love.

The most beautiful thing about love for me is how seamlessly it assumes different forms.

When they bring home pizza for you on the same day you might be craving for some. A telepathic connection, probably.

When they make sure you always have a new eBook ready to satisfy the voracious reader in you. They know what you might need even before you do.

When you leave those last few crunchy fries you so love for them. But they don’t eat it and leave for you instead. Then you just go around in circles asking each other to eat and finally ending up sharing it. Silly but speaks of care.

When they let you eat the burger they actually bought for them self. And then keep teasing you for it.

When they cuddle you back to sleep after you wake up in the middle of the night crying during pregnancy.

When pulling each other’s legs, disagreeing for fun is done without any insecurity.

When you admire that they know the first vote in a general election in India was caste in Himachal Pradesh in the year 1951! Or, just when their mind sweeps you off your feet.

When they constantly keep telling you to make the most of your time while you are on a break, go to the spa or even eat all that you have been craving for at your mom’s before going back home. The subtext of this all being that they are going to miss you while you are away.

When you ask them to be careful when they are out on a road trip with friends. Or, that they go for that IPL match with friends.

When you are happy to be with your family but not quite for you have to spend time away from that one person.

When you are happy being weird together.

All different, unique, yet in so many ways similar shades of love.

I think more than anything else, it’s love which makes life beautiful. Now, it could be love for someone or something. But when that love surpasses the superficial or the customary, it moves beyond the ordinary. It is the force that balances all odds.

Tell me. Do you have someone who loves you so? And do you love someone this way too?

If you do, which I’m sure you do, you’ll know what I have been talking about all throughout in this post.

#MondayMusings