What Love Looks Like

February, the valentine month, tends to bring at least a few passing thoughts about love. And the past few days, I've been thinking a little extra about love: what it means, when it's real, what it looks, feels, and sounds like. And the answer differs depending on the relationship, the situation, the circumstance. However, one piece always seems to remain the same, and that is this: the most important acts of love aren't grand gestures. 

I think love comes the fullest, the truest, in the quiet moments, in the little things, in instinct and loyalty, in laughter and sorrow, in silence, in prayer. It's my favorite way to witness love, those little moments when it seems like nobody else is watching. I'd like to share a few of those instances I've witnessed. Ergo, What Love Looks Like: 

When I was in junior high school, my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer, and when she started chemotherapy, it wasn't long before she started to lose her hair. I think we all know that this is something that usually comes with cancer treatments: losing hair. However, I'm not sure if anyone who hasn't witnessed it really understands what it looks like. It doesn't look like waking up one morning with a cleanly bald head. It looks like matted, soapy strands stuck to your palms in the shower. It looks like a thick chunk from the back of your scalp that comes out in your hairbrush. It comes out messy; it's slow. You don't lose all of it at once. So - there comes a point when the decision has to be made - you're the one who has to decide when it's time to take the rest of it. A few days after my mom's hair started to go, she made the choice: it's time to let it go. And on the day that she decided, I witnessed an act of love, one that I will carry in my memory always: my parents pulled a kitchen chair into the bathroom, got out the clippers, my mother sat in front of the mirror, and my father did it for her. He stood behind the chair, and without hesitation or uncertainty, he very gently shaved her head. With careful precision, and unpracticed accuracy, he removed what was left of her hair. Because he loves her.

My sister had her first baby right before COVID, and her husband, a soldier in the National Guard, was sent away for training while their daughter was a newborn. He had to be gone for weeks at a time; my other sister, my mom, and I are teachers, and schools were shut down because of the pandemic, so my sister and her brand new baby came to stay with my parents while her husband was away. My niece, like many new babies, wasn't a fan of sleeping at night. My sister was a new parent, trying to manage things without her husband in a house that wasn't hers, so some nights my youngest sister would stay at my parents' house with her. She would send her to bed, and take the overnight shift with the baby. She would pace the floors in my parents' basement and try to keep the baby happy and quiet, so her mom could get just a little extra sleep. She stayed up for hours into the night, rocking and walking. And then, when they moved back home and Megan went back to work, their daycare was closed (also because of the pandemic), so my little sister, without complaint or request, drove back and forth to Wayne every week to stay with our niece. Because she loves them.

During my first couple years of college, I was miserable. I hated where I was, my circumstances, my situation, and I was doing poorly. Academically. Mentally. Physically. I was just not thriving in a place I had expected to thrive. And I was afraid. My future was uncertain; I didn't know what I wanted. I felt like I had made an unfixable mistake. That summer after my freshman year, I was with my family on our annual vacation. I remember sitting on the back porch of the house worrying and crying, not seeing a path, not knowing what the right thing was, feeling like a failure. My dad came out to sit next to me. He tucked me under his arm, and he told me something I will not ever forget. Through my sobs and blubbering and fear, he smiled at me. "No matter what, Kater," he told me, "there's not a mistake that we can't fix." He jostled my shoulders until I laughed. "Everything is always going to be okay. This is not the end of the world. So what can we do?" He didn't offer me solutions. He didn't fix my problems for me. But he sat next to me in solidarity. He put a hand on my shoulder while I leared how to fix it myself. Because he loves me.

My sweet boyfriend's father is something of a jack-of-all-trades. Luke and I talk often about how our fathers are so similar in that (and many other) ways. He's just one of those men who knows how to fix it or at least, who to ask about fixing it. Before we started dating, Luke bought a house, a fixer-upper that needs some love and attention. He and his dad have put in uncountable hours working on the house: a new bathroom, a room re-model, new kitchen cabinets, windows, and doors- the list goes on. The window in the bedroom didn't seal properly, so when the weather started to get chilly, the bedroom would get to cold temperatures overnight. One day in the late fall, Luke's dad, on his day off from work, likely after an overnight shift, drove the eighty plus miles to replace the window while Luke was at work, so the bedroom wasn't freezing when the real cold weather showed up. And this isn't an out of the ordinary occurance. Luke's dad often makes the hour and a half trek to fix something or work on something or drop something off, often just when he has a few hours to spare. Because he loves him.

I work with a lot of wonderful people, but our sweet high school Spanish teacher is something exceptional in that regard. She's one of the kindest, most genuine people I've ever known, and she's the mother of four of the sweetest students I've had the pleasure of teaching. When I got to school on the first day of meetings this August, there was a care package on my desk: snacks and hair ties, hand lotion and chapstick, a lint roller, a Tide pen, a journal, and a myriad of other things. The other teachers in our department had the same. She left us each a package of things we may have forgotten we could need. Because she loves us. Because she loves.

One Sunday, in the height of an incredibly difficult season in my life, I went to church with Luke. We sat through the readings and the sermon, and I was admittedly mostly just going through the motions. The last few weeks had been a struggle, and I was maybe a little angry with God. But I was there, and Luke, who supports and loves me in literally everything, was next to me. We stood up for the reading of the weekly list of intentions, and most of it was familiar, until there was a prayer I hadn't expected, one that just felt like it applied directly to me. And all of a sudden I felt like I could not breathe through it. It wasn't more than a beat - a second - before I felt Luke take my hand. His grip was strong, and he squeezed my fingers. And it wasn't my body language he'd noticed; I hadn't reacted visibly or audibly, but he still knew - that in that moment I needed him to hold my hand. I don't think I would have been able to stay standing without it. And he knew without my ever having to tell him. Because he loves me.

Love is the loudest when everything else is quiet. When the rest of the world isn't looking, sometimes when you aren't quite ready for it, when you didn't know you needed it - that's when love shows up, and that's often when it's the most important. Love exists in many loud, grand, beautiful gestures, but I think it feels the biggest when it's small.

• My aunt doesn't ever have to fill her own gas tank. My uncle always does it for her.
• My dad does the dishes every week after Mom cooks Sunday breakfast. 
• Every week, Mom cooks Sunday breakfast - for Dad, me, Luke, my sisters, whoever can be there.
• One of my former students used to bring me coffee when I would come early or stay late to help her.
• When Luke goes to the gas station, he always comes out with my favorite drink, even on days when I say I don't need anything.
• Mom always squeezes my hand when we say the Our Father in church.
• Luke's parents drive countless miles and hours to watch him coach every single one of his basketball games.
• My sisters text new songs that they love to the group chat.
• When something bad or hard or happy or exciting or sad happens, my friends call a "Council Meeting," so we can talk it out or sit with it or just exist in the feelings together.

Love comes in so many different ways and looks like so many different things, and I hope that, during this season of love, the things that stand out for you aren't necessarily grand gestures. I hope that we can all find the beauty in the little things, in the holding of a hand, in the quiet of a prayer, in small thoughtfulness, and kind moments. There's a lot of love in this world. It's nice, sometimes, to take a step back and really notice it. Happy Valentine Season; I hope your loves are simple. I hope they feel like home.