It starts with a look. You see her and you know, you just know. Even if you deny it at the time, that initial feeling will stick with you until you do something about it.
It may not be convenient or even wanted when it first happens, but it is real.
This is part of what I know about love from a man's point of view. I don't know much from a woman's point of view. It may be different. And though I'm talking about heterosexual love, I feel sure that the feelings are similar for same-sex lovers and any kind of gender mix.
Love is love. It's a human condition. And it frequently is disruptive.
If you don't act, that feeling will come around again anyway, even years later, when perhaps your mutual circumstances have changed, even subtly. Suddenly you know it is time to tell her. What you do next matters.
I once wrote a line in a screenplay for a movie that did not get produced: "There are two types of regret. regret for what you did and regret for what you didn't do." That line was either stolen by various writers in Hollywood or it was not original to begin with.
Either way I've heard it used a number of times in films. It's too good to be mine anyway, because it is a universal truth.
In my particular life, which is not a movie, I tended to act on love's impulse. The consequences turned out to be momentous. So which type of regret is mine?
That is a question without an answer.
***
Donald Trump's Republican convention is under way. On the first night, Nikki Haley's measured delivery was impressive and effective, but the harangues by Kimberly Guilfoyle and Don Jr. were laughably ineffective.
Beyond the TV show, which I grade as a C (can't anyone properly mic a guest anymore?), here is what else is moving this overnight:
* More than 500,000 mail ballots were rejected in the primaries. That could make the difference in battleground states this fall.-- The record use of voting by mail during the coronavirus pandemic has increased the possibility of voter error or delayed delivery. (Washington Post)
* Wisconsin Reels After Police Shooting and Second Night of Protests -- Jacob Blake, a Black resident of Kenosha, was shot in the back, setting off condemnations from Wisconsin’s governor and Joe Biden, the Democrats’ presidential nominee. *New York Times)
* Millions fall back into crisis as stimulus and safety nets disappear -- Without federal aid, households on the margins are being pushed to the brink of financial ruin. (Washington Post)
* We’re doing our best with Zoom. But we’ll still need offices — and each other. (Washington Post)
* The litany of people who know and have worked alongside President Donald Trump -- but who now question his fitness for the job -- seems ever-expanding, a roster that now includes a member of his immediate family as well as an unusually large number of national security officials who departed the administration in its first three years. (CNN)
* Sanders on Trump: This is a major effort to undermine election (CNN)
* Former chairman of the Republican National Committee Michael Steele is joining the Lincoln Project, a group of Republicans working to prevent President Donald Trump's re-election. (CNN)
* 4 Years of Catastrophic Fires in California: ‘I’m Numb’ -- For the eight million residents of the San Francisco Bay Area, a ring of fire across Northern California feels inescapable. (New York Times)
* Long before there was such a thing as California, the old-growth giants of Big Basin Redwoods State Park towered over the coast. They burned last week, and the state park, California’s oldest, was closed. [The New York Times]
***
I'd give anything and everything and I will always care
Through weakness and strength
Happiness and sorrow
For better, for worse
I will love you with every beat of my heart
From this moment, you are the one
Right beside you is where I belong
From this moment on
I live only for your happiness
And for your love, I'd give my last breath
From this moment on
I can't wait to live my life with you, I can't wait to start
You and I will never be apart
My dreams came true because of you
I will love you, I promise you this
There is nothing I wouldn't give
From this moment on, oh…
(Written by Shania Twain at a soccer game in Italy.)
-30-
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