What is love?

What is love
Baby don't hurt me
Don't hurt me, no more
Baby don't hurt me
Don't hurt me, no more...

Well it's that time of year to introduce lurrrve poetry, and what better way then to ask students to bring in their favourite love songs and use as a lesson introduction. Hence the above song has been in my head all day long (and it's not even a good song, in fact, it's downright annoying). Some of them had good taste, but wow, some of them just don't know what love is (or what music is)! And for that matter, what is love anyways?

Is this love:

To: §ügâ bâÿ bèê
From: V G
Sent: October 20, 2001

Baby, I just wanted to tell you that I love you, and all day today I was just thinking about you, I was supposed to clean my room but I ended up looking at your book and listening to your CD, thats why I called you so early, I couldnt take it anymore, my emotions were just too high so I just wanted to hear your voice. These last couple days I really started to think of how lucky I am to have someone so special and so caring in my life, you truly are a dream come true.


Is love that powerful and that consuming that it doesn't allow you to clean your room? Does it make you use words like "baby"? Does it make you yearn and want and need?

& Is love so powerful that it can do this:

To: §ügâ bâÿ bèê
From: V G
September 3, 2001

Since I last talked to you I still cant stop thinking about what you said. Honestly I dont think I was ever that hurt in my whole life. It felt like a knife right through the heart, then you twisted it around a bit, and then you pulled it out. I love you soooooooo much and I want to be with you forever... One thing good from all this is that I know a 1000% that I love you with all my heart and soul because if I didnt, I know that it wouldnt hurt this much.

Yikes, I don't even remember what I did to hurt him like that...

V... I'm sorry, whatever I did that day long ago still makes me feel guilty for make you hurt...
Remember that little treehouse attached to the slide at 'our park'? No, not our new park, our old park. Remember how we carved our initials into it with your car keys? I want to go back there this summer and check if it's still there. If it's not there, we need to make it be there.

***

This is one of the warm-up exercises I did with my students today and I'm going to ask everyone who reads this to please join in. All you have to do it simply complete the following sentence however you see fit:

Love is (fill in the blank).

Thanks guys.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres (1 Corinthians 13:4-8)