Love Is Like...a Rock

The weekend is over; our contest is finished (see sidebar for winners) and I guess that about wraps it up for Valentine's Day this year. Before we let go of that holiday, we'd like to share this beautiful story from Pamela.

Love is…Like a Rock

By

Pamela S Thibodeaux

© 2006

My husband is a very tender, sentimental man. From the sweet/romantic cards we still surprise each other with to the “Love Is” comic strip he used to cut out of the newspaper and give to me, our nineteen-year courtship and marriage is filled with romantic moments. He’s even gone so far as to saturate a tiny bear with his, and my, favorite cologne and pin it to the sun-visor of my car. Then there’s our favorite song, “Stuck on You” by Lionel Richey and the local singer who knew the minute we walked in the door what our request would be, evenings of drinking wine and dancing in the kitchen and weekends when we’ve stayed in bed reading and talking or doctoring each other’s cold.

But no matter how many precious memories I recall, there is one that will always stand out in my mind and make my heart skip a beat; the recollection of a warm, balmy evening early in our courtship.

We were parked under an overpass, walking along the railroad tracks and talking when, taking me by the hand, my lover encouraged me to sit beside him on the ground. “My love is like this rock,” he said, as he picked one up and placed it in my hand. “It’s strong and solid, it’ll never change, it’ll last forever, and there’s not another one like it in the world.”

I’d never thought of love like that before, but, like snowflakes, no two rocks are alike. However, linked together snowflakes and rocks, like hearts, can create something strong and solid and secure.

Only One other has expressed His love to me in such enduring terms: strong, solid, unchanging, everlasting. He is known by many names, one being the Rock of Ages.

In 2005 my husband was diagnosed with Congestive Heart Failure (on top of his Diabetes), severe arterial blockage (bypass surgery is not an option), and a defibrillator was embedded in his chest to shock his heart into action should it ever decide to stop beating (like it did while he was hospitalized). Regardless of how grim the outlook or how certain the outcome, whether I’m blessed with nineteen more months or another nineteen years with this man, no memory will move me -nor another love touch me- as deeply as the one symbolized by the rock sitting on my dresser; the rock that will always be a part of my décor.