Love Lives Long After 

(A Re-blog from 2011) 

by Dewaine Wakeman

Well, its finally over: Valentine’s day 2011 draws to a close. Chocolate candies and candles have been cleared off,

cards and packages are tucked well away,

 hugs and kisses have subsided, the gourmet meals have all been served - and the day, in its totality,

 even those intimate moments, (forgive the mention) 

are now finished for everyone.

And what about the day of love itself? 

Why do we celebrate it? Why do we confine it to the celebration of a single day, and a predictable day at that? Would the saints and the poets view this day with any more or any less skepticism?

I’m thinking of my father.

A few years ago, he made a personal wedding gift for my mother. I was awe struck by his thoughtful gift,

 as any reflective person would have been. 

He delivered it to her perfectly on the day without fan fare of their anniversary, coming home from work, 

with no big speeches at all, or any remote sense of pride

 at his accomplishment; he simply said, 

“Here’s your gift, Ruby”

My father gave her a glass-like trophy style monument, 

about 3 feet high, and about 3 feet long, 

and about a foot wide. 

(see picture below)

 It looked sort of like a giant fish aquarium, 

and it had bride and groom replica dolls, over a foot high

 that he had made in exact proportion

to my mother and dad’s wedding picture, 

which stood nearby.

The monument included trellises 

adorning the symbolically happy couple, 

miniature flowers as well, 

and, tiny pots of correct size, and color proportion

to their actual wedding event, with ivy leaves draping everything, as it was recreated. 

Inside of the monument, engraved in gold,

which too, he made for her, reads: 

Happy 41st Anniversary, 

February 10, 2003, Love you, Alwin. 

It even was equipped with electricity and a bulb

so that it could even have the possibility of being admired,

 for example, on a random day say at 3:00 in the morning,

 on the Third of December if one so chose to.

Also, he did not give this present on some predictable day either, say like, the 50th Anniversary of their wedding;

 he gave it on the oddest year possible - the 41st year. 

Which was very wise in retrospect for him, 

and fortunate for those he loved as well, 

as he did not live to see his 50th year Anniversary, anyway, but was taken.

The reflective life of my father, has taught me one thing 

about love, however, and about life in general: 

Love is not confined to a day, or to a time, 

or even to an event, per se… 

His 41st gift lives on, 

as does the light he made to light it, 

and the bride and groom still light up as well, 

and from beyond the grave - the love of his life you might say, is living on every day and every way in his eternal soul. 

And it is still surviving in his wife and kids, who even in death hold him in esteem eternally.

You see, Love is a state of mind,

 a constant, 

whether in this life or the next, 

which bring about all good things,

 and in the now, 

and eternally!!!

That itself is the kingdom of heaven within us -

our highest calling, 

our state of mind, 

which dwells in the eternal flame of loving kindness.

Love is an eternal state of mind,

My dad knew this,

and that is the kind of love he had,

and the kind of life he lived,

long after the valentine was opened,

or the anniversary gift was given.