Every Kind of Love

So this is the last love song post before NEW FICTION here on the blog tomorrow for Valentine’s Day, and I saved one with an unorthodox musical style for a love song, and an unorthodox title for a love song for last. This one might be a ‘weird’ choice, but 1. my blog and I’m weird, so… 2. I love it and 3. *it contains the greatest single line in a love song ever.*

I’m dead serious about number 3.
(For those who are unfamiliar with this song/artist…beware the guitar feedback at the beginning/a couple of other intervals…it gets LOUD.)

It’s Dead Leaves and the Dirty Ground by The White Stripes. 

I feel this way about J, and I imagine most people in love feel this way about the person they love (all the romantic love stories I’ve written are like that)…wanting to be together as much as possible…bummed when they aren’t around, happy when they are. All the lyrics are pretty good, but I know you all might be questioning that this song contains the best line in a love song ever. It’s a strange ‘love song’ selection, and I made that assertion about it having the best line ever, and I mean it. In fact, this one line is so good, it makes pretty much the rest of the song, and every other love song…love story…all my words and everyone else’s regarding love…redundant. It cuts right down to the heart of love. It’s what feeling love for a person essentially IS.

Here it is:

‘And every breath that is in your lungs is a tiny little gift to me.’

That’s every love story ever told in that one line, isn’t it? It’s every kind of love. It’s love in any and every form. It’s every love story I’ve ever written. It’s every one I’ve loved that I’ve read or seen or heard about, in fiction or real life. It’s how I feel about J. It’s how I feel about our Boy. It’s how I feel about my best friend, A. It’s how I feel about the rest of my family and friends. It’s how I feel about the writers of the fiction and journalism and music I admire. It’s how I feel about every person who’s ever taught me or helped me or comforted me. It’s how I feel about people who do those things for other people. It’s how I feel about my dog (and dogs in general, too, really).

That line is my all time favorite line in a love song. I wish I wrote it. I wish that everyone had someone (or more than one someone) in their lives that felt that way about them. I wish every child felt that way about their parents and every parent felt that way about their children. I wish every friendship was full of that mutual feeling. I wish every romance was full of that feeling too. I wish that every person actively had that thought about the people they love on a regular basis, and maybe even said it out loud to them. So that line is why the modern punk song is the finale of Love Song Month. It’s every love song. It’s every love story. It’s every kind of love.

PS—ONE of these featured love songs (I won’t say which one) was the song J and I danced to for the first dance at our wedding. If you all would like to venture a guess at which one it is…I’ll let you know if you’re right. New fiction coming tomorrow!