Friend, Wife & Lover of Charles

What a waste of human flesh, not to be a whole-hearted lover of someone.

You don't fathom unconditional love until someone actually gives it to you. Or rather... shows it to you. And I don't mean in that Hallmark, heart shaped box-of-chocolates, red roses kind of way.

Unconditional love does not lend itself to the grand gesture. It is buried deep in the rituals of daily life....in the filling, drinking from and washing of your cup.

People with the rare capacity to love unselfishly have the power to change your life in a tremendous way...by seeping into it...in thousands of infintesimally small ones.

The accumulation of tiny acts of grace are far greater than any one day could pay thanks for. Gratefulness too...must be offered up in handfuls...morning, noon and night.

And celebrations themselves are frought with condition and expectations...while unconditional love is the ultimate defier of them.

Unconditional love knows only one word. YES.

Unconditional love is all about yes.

Yes to new friendships and adventures.

Yes to insatiable passions and things you only thought you wanted to try.

Yes to all pursuits of personal growth.

Yes to playing every old record in your collection.

Yes to funky new haircuts and lots of other meaningless physical changes.

Yes to every one of your darkest secrets and your awful truths.

Yes to reaching painful conclusions.

Yes to fits of simultanious laughter and tears when frustration is ripping you in half.

Yes to every minute of lost sleep wondering what else can be done.

Yes to complete stillness and silence when there is no more need for words.

Yes to ALL things spur of the moment.

And most especially, YES to dancing...dancing anywhere and everywhere.

Dancing in the grocery store check-out lane...

dancing at the car wash,

dancing amid the crowd at parent-teacher night...

dancing past the nurse's station on the way to a cat-scan...

Lots and LOTS of dancing.

And yes to everything.

From the one person in my life who has always loved me without condition...I have never asked for anything that I did not receive ten-fold...from both his hands and his wide-open, insanely generous heart.

So when I say I am the friend, wife and lover of Charles...I could not be more serious.

Charles...you have been strangely familiar to me from the instant I first heard your voice... a mystery I have yet to unravel...and fall asleep every night hoping we have enough time to understand.

Thank you baby...on this and every other day, for teaching me how to love a little something about every moment...most especially, the ordinary ones.