When you finally learn to love

The WORD love can feel pretty useless. I want to be very clear on that. It doesn’t even come close to representing ALL the different ways or times that I have cared for people. Family, friends, partners, pets. The waves. The moments. The phases. So, I rarely could I describe the extent of my feelings with that word. However, it is the one that we have.

I made a note in my journal a few months ago regarding something I read about love. It was Elizabeth Lesser, again, referencing her relationship with her dying sister. It was a question about “that moment when you finally learn to love another.” It made me pause. Three of the words, in particular, made me pause.

Learn. You mean I may need to be a student of love? There are lessons. It doesn’t just happen?

Finally. This indicates that it could be a long pursuit.

Moment. Learning to love can hinge on a moment? Even after a long period of learning?

That moment when you finally learn to love another. That was it.  I started to wonder, if there really is such a moment, did I have that moment?

Is it possible that I never gave myself fully to love Tim until he needed me so much? There was nothing left to lose. There was no expectation of anything in return. There was nothing else to do. No competing interests. No hidden agendas. No ego. There was only love.

After our wedding, on Tim’s deathbed, my exact words to myself and friends within earshot were, “I now know why I never got married before. Because this is exactly how it was supposed to be. There could never have been a wedding where I felt a greater expression of love than this one.”

There were many moments in Tim’s last week of life, that I can reflect on and acknowledge, yes, that brought me closer to love.

• Care taking. I mean the real hard stuff. Not fetching a glass of orange juice from the fridge. Not a quick run to the pharmacy for Nyquil. But without anxiety or shame, nursing someone who is very ill.
• Watching a great man suddenly slow down with humor and grace.
• Observing others express their own love for him.
• Handling my own fear. I was scared. But the clock was ticking and there was no time to pause for that.
• Following my intuition as I managed each day and doing what needed to be done ONLY out of LOVE.

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I mean, did I really not know how to love before that? It’s a crazy thought. Maybe it’s true.

Is this why I have had the sense, all along, that Tim died in a state of love, because I was there too?

If indeed, there is a moment, and I have had it and finally learned to love another, what next?

Does this mean I am done?

Does my soul get to check this thing off the list?

Or does it mean I now know better so I will do better the next time?

Does it mean that I will only love for all the right reasons? That I will fully trust. That I will live in truth.

Clearly, there are more questions here than answers.  I don’t expect that I will figure this out. It just feels right to wonder. And if I did finally learn to love during Tim’s last few weeks of life, my greatest hope is that Tim felt it.

* Elizabeth Lesser, Marrow: Love, Loss and What Matters Most