My Love Language

Time was, when we talked about “loving," we had a fairly agreed-upon concept in mind. Saint Paul put it thusly to the good people of Corinth, and his wise words have since been repeated in approximately 10 jillion wedding ceremonies, draining them of all meaning:

"Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable; it keeps no record of wrongs; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends."   (1 Corinthians 13 v. 4-8)

I amended this ever so slightly:

"Love is patient, as long as loved one gets to the damn point sometime in the next century. Love is not envious/boastful/arrogant/rude, unless there are GOOD REASONS to be those things. Love does not insist on its own way, but if Love's way is correct, of course it does insist. Love is understandably irritable if Love is awakened in the middle of the night by loved one's unbearable snoring (and Love does keep records). Love rejoices in the truth, so long as the truth is that Love is beautiful, bright, funny and generally far superior to all other spouses. Love believes, hopes and endures to a certain extent; Love is not an idiot. Love never ends, except when it does."

There, fixed it for you, Paul!

Well, now, a mere 2000 years later, along comes Dr. Gary Chapman and his bestselling tome, "The 5 Love Languages." Apparently there are a mere handful of specific ways people show their devotion to one another:

ACTS OF SERVICE

QUALITY TIME

WORDS OF AFFIRMATION

PHYSICAL TOUCH

RECEIVING GIFTS

Let me get this straight. My significant other can show me his love, not by buying me a diamond bracelet, but by lugging the trash can (filled wit his trash) to the curb? He can spend his idea of Quality Time with me (watching football) and that counts as affection? As for Words of Affirmation, what woman wouldn't be swept off her feet by a man telling her she does an excellent load of (his) laundry? Then there's Physical Touch: all well and good, but high fives and fist bumps should not count as adequate PDAs. Finally, "Receiving" Gifts. I'm a tad confused--isn't giving gifts the truer sign of love? I mean, when the four year old birthday child grabs the toy that mommy drove all over creation to find, does the grunt accompanying said grab mean "I'm so eternally grateful, mother dear, and I love you"? Convince me!

I believe that Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing, but much of the splendor comes from its myriad expressions. Let's not be so limiting! As for me, I finally found the meme that explained my personal love language better than I ever could...

My love language is cooking elaborate meals screaming at everyone to get out of the kitchen then loudly announcing the food was NOT MY BEST and waiting for compliments.

Hugs and kisses!