Love, Demonstrated

One thing that was a turning point in being a grown up, married person was when I learned how to see the love in what my husband was doing--instead of expecting him to show me love the way I thought it should look. This week, he is doing something for me that could be easy to overlook as an expression of his love.

I'm half-heartedly looking for an SUV. I say "half-heartedly" because I will probably have to give up the car I have now, which I love-love-love. As in L.O.V.E. love. He really couldn't care less about things that I like, such as heated leather seats, satellite radio and navigation. But he is carefully looking for what I want, and not necessarily what he thinks I should want. I know he would probably rather I would pick a truck like his, and he prefers cloth seats to leather.

Instead, he is looking for MY preferences. That is a very sweet expression of love: he isn't trying to find "good enough", or something to make do with. He isn't rationalizing that I put very few miles on a vehicle and therefore don't really need any bells and whistles. He isn't pushing his preference and he isn't contesting any of my reasons for what I want from a vehicle. He just wants me drive something that makes me happy. And he is loving enough to be content with the knowledge that what makes my skirt fly up about a vehicle is different than what he wants in his daily driver, and that is OK.

Oh, how I love that man.