Hormones or Heartburn

I love football.
I love the Beatles.
I love a good steak.
I love beer.
I love moonlit walks.
I love the sound of gurgling brook.
I love motorcycles.
I love convertibles.
I love your dress.
I love your hair.
I love a good movie.
I love my house.

I love you?

Many groups have through out the years discussed the prevalence of sex, violence and four letter words that we as a society must wade thru on a daily basis. Their primary concern has been that we will become hardened to such events and will be unable to separate the entertainment from the reality. Focusing on the negative effects that the over exposure to the poor choice of entertainment we make is a noble cause. However, I feel that we have been missing the forest in amongst the trees.

A far greater danger is the rampant over usage of the word love.

For so many people the word love has become a catchall phrase for everything in life that we are drawn to from our spouses, to our children, from our parents to our siblings, to every animate and inanimate object we desire.

How can our children begin to comprehend the importance of the word love when they hear it tossed around like baseball on the playground? Mom loves her job. Dad loves his new tool. Grandpa loves his new television. Grandma loves listening to Bing Crosby. Everybody loves something.

What are we teaching our children what the word love stands for when we say we love our spouse and meatloaf in practically the same sentence?

More than a few of my friends have had someone they were dating whisper I love you after only three or four dates. Now, the romantic in me still believes in love at first site but the realist stands back looks at the abundance of broken families and wonders if we take love and marriage seriously enough.

In reality whispering I love you so early in a relationship is usually a euphemism for what is really being thought and/or felt. I love you at that point can mean the sex was great, the conversation was great, your company was great. It seems that so often now people are confusing hormones or heartburn for something deeper and more beautiful.

I have found that even some married couples over use the word. One or both spouses are constantly saying I love you from the end of each and every phone conversation to every time they pass in the halls at home. A couple who is secure in their love and their marriage usually do not need to repeat I love you a thousand times a day. Actions through out the day speak volumes where words can eventually become empty.

My wish would be for the word love to be returned to a more lofty position or at least behind glass like a fire alarm. With a sign above that reads break glass in the case of true love.