“Honey, I’m heading off to work, don’t overstrain yourself, and please call me if you need me for something, anything at all.” The concerned voice of Matt floats through the air of the bedroom, trying to find a clear entrance towards the section of my sore brain that’s in charge of interpreting verbal stimuli.
“Hrmumble…” I reply.
For the past few days I’ve been floored with a terrible flu. Unable to go to work (hurray!) I was stuck inside my home, doing nothing but sleeping and realising how filthy our house had become (not so hurray). Basically my days existed out of kissing my boyfriend goodbye before he went to work and waiting for him to return.
And throughout one of those days something extraordinary happened. All kinds of weird feelings started to appear in my head and stomach. I felt like I was being lifted by tiny butterflies and sprinkled with sunbeams. And all the butterflies and sunbeams had only one reason and purpose: Matt.
I wanted to shower my boyfriend with love. I wanted to cut out heart shaped cards out of pink cardboard and write him love poems, love songs, complete musicals. Clean up the house, cook him a spectacular dinner, bake a cake with white sugary topping and little sugar flowers on it, decorate the house with garlands (why on earth?!) and buy loads of flowers… and many many more soppy romantic things I’d never thought I’d ever think of, let alone want to do.
I’d already put my coat on and stood in the doorway, but I forced myself back into the house to sit on the couch. I forced myself to think why I wanted to do all those silly, romantic things, before I would run off to the shops to buy all the preparations. It must be the fever I thought at first. But then maybe…
Was it because I had finally, inadvertently but still, found the time to let all those love feelings creep up upon me? Maybe because there was nothing else to do, no stressful work, no time-consuming social contacts, no lengthy to-do-lists, I couldn’t help but start having true feelings?
Funnily I’ve had loads of conversations with myself in the past about why I couldn’t have a Hollywood movie kind of relationship, that I was a rationalized nerd girl, unromantic, and that I just had to accept this part of my personality. But maybe I wasn’t a heartless person; maybe I had just been too busy…
It’s a fact that busy couples with stressful lives have less sex than average, or, if you need a scarier figure, probably less sex than their parents. People above 50 still have, on average, sex once a week, while stressful couples may forget about sex for months. Because Matt and I have no such problem (another hurray) I always assumed that therefore we weren’t too busy or stressful. But maybe I’d been wrong. Maybe, although our sex life is perfectly healthy, our constant busy bee behaviour has indeed affected our relationship. I had stopped realising how much I care about Matt.
I know I’m not the only one. I’ve heard the same stories and complaints from over-busy friends and colleagues. This leaves me with one crucial question: Are we all so busy that we forget to love?
What a nonsense and useless thing it is that we let such a beautiful miracle like love be overgrown by the weeds of our jobs and other obligations! What utter stupidity that we seem to take love for granted while we use our energy for meeting people we could live without and making more and more money we don’t really need!
Right during my fierce internal monologue the key turns round inside the keyhole of the door. It’s Matt, three hours early. “I don’t feel so good, so I went home. I think you are contagious… I’m sorry for breaking into your sick day…”
“That’s okay, sweetie, I feel quite rested and well again. Just sit down and make yourself comfy and I’ll get you a cup of tea. Since I have the day off from work, I have all the time in the world for you…”
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Am glad that your recent fluey thingie gave you the chance to halt the busy stuff for a bit and allow you to appreciate Matt and all his loveliness :) Wishing you and Matt better soon x
Left by London-Lass on Monday, July 9th, 2007