Lucky in Love
For Boog Powell, it was pulling the inside fastball - whipping around, wrists snapping through the zone like lightning, hips turning like a lathe, eyes following the rotation of the red Haitian-sewn seams - the inside fastball was his and then it was gone.
For Ken Jennings, trivia. For Dave Navarro, notes shredded like frozen steel. For Admiral Perry, ice. For Satan, fire.
For me, love.
We’ve all got that thing. Born with it? Maybe. We labor at other tasks. I can’t garden so well. My sewing skills falter. Socially, I’ve been grinding it out since Tammy Hald asked me for a homework answer in the fifth grade and I couldn’t hear her voice, just my heart trying to pound my eardrums into pulp. I could hear the blood rushing through my veins, carrying my self-confidence away to some distant planetoid within my scrawny pale ten-year-old cosmos. My knees shook so hard that the needle moved, almost imperceptibly but scientifically valid, on a seismograph somewhere.
I’ve come around as a communicator, with work, and now if asked a question by an attractive woman I can represent my species in a relatively decent way. I no longer sweat at the thought of all those x-chromosomes in close proximity. I can maintain an even strain without going insane in the membrane. But, it’s been a grind.
Love’s no grind.
A few days ago, in a sizable hotel room perched atop the fancy Mandalay Bay casino/resort in Las Vegas, deep in the the brutal/reclaimed Nevada desert, I had the good fortune to marry the woman of my dreams, that girl that boys spend their lives wishing they were with, the tan and gorgeous sunshine of my soul. The room overflowed with love. Friends had flown in from all over, including some I had met in person for the first time a scant 24 hours earlier. They were all there to celebrate the existence of love. My heart did not pound, nor did I sweat or shake. I am at my best when I am the epicenter of a universe of love. I am the king of the vast realm of the heart.
Love is what I do.
I can wax rhapsodic about all of the facets of my love-blessed relationship, and trust me, I will. But, it comes down to the ability to give and receive the most beautiful gift of all, and that ability was handed to me, carefully and casually, by my mother. I learned from the day I was born that all of the money and cars and wars and deceptions and executive jobs and washroom attendant slaveries in the world would not hold up to love. I learned that most of the fun of getting there is getting there and that love poured generously and willy-nilly into a hungry world would return, a zillion-fold, before the earth had cooled as the day’s sun set. You give it, it comes back, and if you believe then it will always be.
I’m lucky in love. And love is lucky in me.
Some people are scholars, or poets, or mechanics, or mobsters. Some can carry a tune. Some can make fancy things. Some sleep better than I do. Some are taller, and more beautiful. Some people are achievers.
I’m a lover. And that, my dear loves, is its own reward, sustainable and perfect. And that’s all I want or need.
I’m lucky that way.
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This week, our LJ Idol task was to write about "in your wheelhouse." Love, my friends, is in my wheelhouse. Or so I feel. Thanks for reading!