THIS IS WHAT LOVE LOOKS LIKE… TODAY By Pennie Hunt

What does love look like to you today?
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Love can look different every day. It looks different on the good days and the bad. During the hard stuff and the easy moments. Love shows up in many forms and dances with different rhythms depending on the love that is required.

When I was around 5 or 6, I received a Chatty Cathy doll for Christmas. I wanted that doll so badly. I talked about it all the time. I circled it in the JCPenney’s Christmas Catalog. I dreamt of it. When I opened my gift, I was the happiest I thought I could ever be in life. On that day, I believed love looked like a Chatty Cathy doll.

I remember when my babies were born. Holding them for the first time, I counted their toes as they wrapped their tiny hands around my finger and held on tightly. They somehow knew that I would protect them, care for them, and love them. Those days of birthing my children were the most love-filled days of my life. Love can look different every day, but on those days, love looked like a white blanket cocooned around a squeaky baby.  

One of my favorite photographs from my wedding was a close-up of my husband’s hand holding mine as we said our vows. He was promising to hold my hand through anything that came into our lives, good or bad – he would be there. Love can look different every day, but on that day, it looked like his hand holding mine.

In the years before my mother passed, when I visited her, she would smile like my visit was the best thing in her life. And when I left, she would smile through her tears. Love can look different every day, but on those days, it looked like my mom’s smile.

Love has been disguised during some of the most difficult days of my life. During those days, I had to remind myself that this is what love looks like today. Love looked like massaging my dad’s feet, helping him walk, and caring for him as he was dying. Love looked like my friends holding me up when I couldn’t breathe after my son passed. Love looked like bringing home a black and white puppy, loving her for 16 years, and holding her so she wasn’t alone when we said goodbye.

On the days it showed itself as wide-open full-throttle joy, love looked like celebrating weddings, welcoming grandchildren, and laughter around a holiday table. And love can look simple, like a phone call from a grandchild, happy dancing paws on the floor when I come home, a card I receive from a friend just to say hi, or my husband’s hand still holding mine.

Over the years, love has danced around me and looked different depending on the day, the circumstance, and the need.
Today, love looks like my life.
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                                                  Pennie’s Life Lesson:
   Remember, love looks different every day, but today, this is what love looks like. 
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