I love you.

Those three words have become “the moment” in movies, books, songs, even real life.
It seems we have been pausing for “I love you” to slip from our lover’s lips since the beginning of time.

They are iconic words, but what lies beneath can be as vast and varied as the people that say them.  Yet, it is written into our lives that “those three little words” are a big deal.  They mean commitment, a grand gesture, in the eyes of many.

He or she loves you, it is official.

I love you is…heart racing, can’t live without you, up all night, making plans, happily ever after, right?  I don’t think so.

They are really just words.  I’m not trying to sound all grown up, heartbroken, Alanis Morissette here, but it’s true.

“I love you,” on the surface, is easy.  It’s lights, camera, action, cut easy.

It could mean, “I love you tonight” or “I will love you as long as all you need is the minimum from me and you continue to go to the gym or drive the same car.”  For some people, it means, “I’m committed to you and only you, unless things change or I get distracted,” and for others it translates, “I love you as much as I’m capable of loving anyone.”

I feel like three different little words, well one contraction and two words, are really the gesture we are all looking for…

I’ve Got You.

That’s the small print in the flush of “I love you,” if it means what all the movies and wedding dances tell us it means.

“I’ve got you.  On the days you’re stunning and sexy and brilliant, for the stretches of time when you can be downright ugly inside and out, I’ve got you.  Through the months you think you can’t make it one more day and the years you carry the weight of the world.  I’ve got you if it’s malignant or a miscarriage, and all those days you can’t find the sun. Whether your heart is breaking or overflowing, if we win and when we lose.  Lean back, it’s okay, let me hold you because you are the person, not the body, the hairline or the mood, not the success story or the bank account.  You are the person, the soul, the friend, the lover that I choose for the journey.”

Now that’s the details, that’s…well, that’s the work and a true happily ever after.

In all fairness, there is no way anyone can pack that into the “I love you.”  It’s not possible.

You don’t know in the beginning, when you can’t get enough of his smell or you’re learning all the shades of his eyes.  Maybe “I love you” gets the attention, all the press.  They are three wonderful words, but I guarantee “I’ve got you” is what takes people into the sunset.

My thoughts from the laundry room.  I’ll Get the Lights.

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