I read romance novels. I write romance novels. I love to watch romantic movies. So it would be easy to say I really like love stories.

This weekend, I remembered that love can be seen in so many different ways. True love is a nineteen year-old uncle not missing a beat when his three year-old niece has snot running out of her nose, and he grabs a tissue, tells her to blow, and cleans her up. It’s two old friends sitting talking on a braided rug like they have so many times over the decades, but this time with four of their five collective children. It’s a little sister braving her fear of bees to get close enough to a hive to take a picture of her brother. It’s a teen boy making sure his suit for a wedding he’s in fits perfectly, and wanting the bride to weigh in as to how it looks. It’s a husband who really wanted to sit and read for a bit going out in the rain to tie back tomatoes and pick raspberries because his wife was in the midst of a grief meltdown and needed time in the garden.

So as I finally have some fiction writing time tonight, it struck me that love can be flashy and romantic and full of grand gestures, or true love can be quiet and steadfast and show itself in the most unexpected ways.