Free Love: Don't be frigid with your words

My friend today told us all on Facebook that she has made some friends during her time with the SCA, Society for Creative Anachronism, a place where they recreate the arts and skills of 17th Century Europe. Yes that exists, and yes they are not usually sober when they hang out in costumes jousting and shit. Some of her friends she met along the way in the SCA have become more like extended family to her, and she posted to her Facebook friends that she may tell you that she loves you, and she's not doing it to be awkward, and she hopes you don't take it wrong.

I'm not usually a feeling person, like the notion of expressing how I feel about you outside of "you piss me the fuck off eat shit and die," doesn't really come naturally to me. If I really like you, what's probably going to happen is I just talk on and on around you because you broke the wall surrounding my comfort zone. To me, that should be a compliment, like that's a big deal tearing down protective walls people build around their oh-so-precious feelings. Most people, however, don't see it as a compliment. Instead, they are more annoyed that I won't shut up.

But throughout the recent years, I've become more of a softy where I am not afraid to tell random people that I love them. I think it all started when I was on the phone with my mechanic, and I said, "Bye. I love you." By accident. I was just so much in the habit of saying it to my mom and husband on the phone, the only two people I usually talk to, that it slipped. I didn't realize the oops until long after I hung up. He thought it was just hilarious, so we started confessing our undying love for each other every time we talked. People might of thought he was my husband because we were so comfortable saying, "I'll be back tomorrow, Love ya." ... "alright, love ya too sweetie."

One day I was talking to him on the phone and said I love you, and the husband raised an eyebrow. I was like, "It's just Matt."

This might be a good time to mention that Matt was also married, a little older than me, and missing some teeth. It wasn't romantic what so ever. We flirted a little out of fun, but it really was platonic at the heart of it. I'm saying this for those of you who are thinking I professed my love to a guy I fantasize about stripping with my teeth. No it wasn't like going up to your old high school crush and saying, "I love you, just so you know."

I should also mention that Matt just recently passed away. He will forever be in my heart and maybe some day, I'll see him again in heaven, with Crest Commercial perfect teeth despite all the dipping and smoking.

My friend's post today got me thinking though... I don't know if it's an American thing because I do imagine Europeans to be much different, but it might be a people thing, but we are afraid to tell people we love them. We are more cautious about using those words with someone than we are about wrapping our legs around them, nekkid, inserting things. The words, "I love you" to us seem to be more sacred than our virginity, and we reserve that for only people we consider family, whether it's your mother or some guy who has been hanging around your sofa for the last year. I think the reason we wait for a person to feel like family to tell them how we feel is because we are scared otherwise. We wait until they tear down the walls surrounding our comfort zone to get into things like expressing feelings.

Instead, what we do is find other ways to show affection. Ways that don't entail professing secret feelings. Little things like buying someone's coffee, or actually listening to what they say (you should be doing that to everyone you speak to, just sayin). Things that if someone said, "you are doing this because you love me," you can hide behind some other excuse. The point is, we do little things in code hoping the other person never finds out your real intentions behind doing something nice or goofy. We do this to protect ourselves from "rejection."

Is it so wrong to let someone know you care?

I mean we all wish people cared about us more. We all wish more people cared about us. The main motivation for humans, of all cultures, of all time, is love. We all desire love more than any riches, more than any self actualization or transcendence (which love is part of those things), more than anything we can imagine. Most religious people expect LOVE from their God for a reason. In reality, God is Love. We all seek that, in some way or form from each other, from our pets, from our children, from our stuffed animals as children.... Love is so valued that we are all eager to take it, but cautious about giving it. Even our wealthiest would rather donate money before showing love.

How many of you hide your pain? If I asked you, "How are you?" How many of you would respond with, "Fine," regardless of how you feel? With that said, how many of you would have a much better day just to hear someone say, "I love you." And for them to mean it.

Maybe if we told each other we loved each other more often than we fuck each other, maybe some of the world's problems might go away magically. Seriously, our biggest problem of all in society, our economy, our government... our biggest problem is our attitude. An attitude that might get adjusted when it knows it's loved.

I'm asking you to put aside your fears of rejection and just tell people how you feel about them, not for your sake, but for their's. Even if they push you away, you know deep down inside they needed to hear it.

P.S. I'm not going to my high school crush and telling him I love him by the way. Do I look like Adele? I'll buy him a drink though.