True Love

I'm reading L. M. Montgomery's "Anne of Green Gables" series and, of course, I'm caught up in the romance of it. I'm also fresh from a little bout of illness (which I think was the flu, but didn't get to develop due to rest and good eating and drinking water!), which served to remind me of the make of the man I married. He is made from the strongest character there is. And our love is made from the strongest bond of friendship there is, but shaped into a romance. I know just exactly how blessed I am every day to be with the person I want to be with most in the world. And to see him reflected in our daughter is beyond what I can describe in words. I am so grateful that I learned, after searching far and wide, that the truest love was to be had right at home. And that love has become my home, a shelter from the storm built on the Rock.

I read this passage today at the end of Anne of Avonlea and it described our love so perfectly that I had to share. Anne has taken her view of love out of classic romantic stories and can't imagine that it could be next to her all the time, but she's starting to see things differently.

It was as if a veil that had hung before her inner consciousness had been lifted, giving to her view a revelation of unsuspected feelings and realities. Perhaps, after all, romance did not come into one's life with pomp and blare, like a gay knight riding down; perhaps it crept to one's side like an old friend through quiet ways; perhaps it revealed itself in seeming prose, until some sudden shaft of illumination flung athwart its pages betrayed the rhythm and the music; perhaps... perhaps... love unfolded naturally out of a beautiful friendship, as a goldenhearted rose slipping from its green sheath.