A Foreign Phrase

Growing up my family was very cold. Wait a minute, "Was" and "Still are" would be more like it. I remember the first time I heard the words, "I love you." It was on television. It was like a foreign phrase, a foreign lifestyle. I suppose it was there that I learned what family was and could be. My father never used the word in front of me. My mother never did either. So my exposure to this wonderful world of love was by watching how other families treated eachother. I suppose responsiblity was more how my father and mother chose to express it. There were no hugs. There were a few happy smiles that where shared, but very little of it resembled what I witnessed when I visited my friends houses or saw the happy families on television. Strangely, since I knew no differently I didn't think it unusual. But something deep down inside made me wish for that kind of life. Today my old family is no different. They are still cold people.

I now have love, however, as I incorporated my acquired taste from the staged relationships of Hollywood into my own family. My children were hugged and even as adults we still hug eachother. My children were told by me that I love them. They also tell me that I am loved. They fully understand the meaning and importance of those words, even incorporating them into their lives and their children's lives. To them It is not a foreign phrase or lifestyle.

It was almost as if I was born into a family of immigrants who never knew the language of love. They still speak their foreign language never choosing to learn a new way to speak, a new way to live. I fully rejected my heritage about this practice. I wanted my children and myself to experience the Hollywood style of "love." I played the part. I had been rehearsing it since I was a child, practicing for the time when I would be the "Daddy." It was my dream to break away from my past life and live in the spotlight. I am still receiving applause from my children today in the form of hugs and true heartfelt love. We say, "I Love you" and we know we mean it. We hug eachother and we miss eachother.

Have I been told, "I Love You?" Yes I have, finally, from my children. I love hearing them say those words everytime. It used to be a foreign phrase and lifesyle. I now have learned it and taught it. It is my native language. I no longer speak the cold loveless language of my past. In fact, It is so foreign I don't remember how.