I don't want to live

I want to love first, and live incidentally

-zelda fitzgerald to her husband f. scott.

I was reading some old love letters. The one above was written in 1919 in the spring.

I have gone from not saying I love you to anyone for a long time, to saying it a lot lately.

And the strange thing to me about this word, love, is that it really means different things to me. It depends on who I am saying it to.

I wonder if it means different things to those I say it to.

I wonder if the word is cheapened by overuse. Or is it the concept of love I wonder about?

Can it's concept be cheapened? And what is the concept of love? I know to some, I love you, means I love what you can do for me.

I know for others saying it is like saying, you can use me, and if you hurt me, I will aplogise for being hurt by you.

To some it means, I am not a whole person by myself, and you are what makes me one.

I know it can mean, I admire you, and I respect you, and I would like to have the influence of your life in mine.

And it can mean, I trust you with my heart, and my feelings. It can mean, I accept you how you are, without necessary adjustments. Even the not so pretty parts that live in all of us.

So if I tell you I love you, I know what I mean. If you wonder, ask me. I will tell.

What do YOU mean when YOU say I love you.