Tick-Tock: The Love Clock

I spend an obscene amount of my daily allotments of clock ticks considering what I'm not good at. Like ending sentences in prepositions (gah!), there are some habits my stubbed and lazy toe just refuses to give a good kick. Thinking is one of those.

While thinking, on its own, ain't so bad (hello, vapid damsels needing a shot of "Aha!"), too much thinking is a killer. It is the assassin of simple conversation, the wrinkler of a smooth line. And I am guilty of such murder.

Still, I consider what I'm not good at (Preposition again), and I can't seem to kick the habit. So I think, and I think about love the most. Really. Not money: I'm a pretty good saver and thrifty by nature. Not time: most days, there's enough of it, and I'm content that I did not fritter. Really, my list of not's is longer than not. But love. Ah, now there's a rub.

I don't think I'm exactly bad at loving others, myself, and God - Who must sit atop all lists always. It's more like I'm assuming my line of good can become better; that better can increase to best; and that best is a term dependent on how far out I draw my line of definition...which means "best" can always be stretched to new limits. The danger may lie in never being satisfied and, I reckon, I'm sometimes guilty of that, too. But if I remain unsatisfied, my glass is raised to a sentiment expressed just like this:

If my definition of best be short of Yours for my heart, for my time, for my hands, God, then make me think about more. About better. About stretching my line of best.

I want to love like Him.
Here's a guy who gets that, too.
So I thought I'd share it - just in case you want to think about it, too.

“The love for equals is a human thing--of friend for friend, brother for brother. It is to love what is loving and lovely. The world smiles. The love for the less fortunate is a beautiful thing--the love for those who suffer, for those who are poor, the sick, the failures, the unlovely. This is compassion, and it touches the heart of the world. The love for the more fortunate is a rare thing--to love those who succeed where we fail, to rejoice without envy with those who rejoice, the love of the poor for the rich, of the black man for the white man. The world is always bewildered by its saints. And then there is the love for the enemy--love for the one who does not love you but mocks, threatens, and inflicts pain. The tortured's love for the torturer. This is God's love. It conquers the world.”
                                                                 ~ Frederick Buechner