If Not Blue

Some late-night ruminations on February -- in its bone chill, in its promise of Spring, throw in a dash of Joni Mitchell in her beauty and her melancholy, and you've got this piece. xo

It is February, and to this day I love the tradition, instilled since childhood, of creating heart-shaped somethings for those around me. Never underestimate the power of a little card, a little time, a little care — how much those moments add up when laid out altogether. To me, those little things mean love.

the aforementioned process of creating heart-shaped somethings.

Something else to know about me is that I like to listen to Joni Mitchell at times when I’m thinking far too hard about what it means to be human. Both Sides Now¹ walked me into one of the hardest conversations I’ve ever had to have with a very solid sense of self. A Case Of You made me swoon at 19, imagining great loves that didn’t text like college guys, The Circle Game was a favorite of my mom’s, while River is an absolute favorite of mine. And Joni’s studio album, Blue, makes me think a lot about love. On a road trip some summers ago, my friend and I listened to it the whole drive up and back. 10 songs, 36 minutes and 15 seconds, on repeat.

This sentence came to me the other night, “what is love, if not blue?” This is actually how a lot of my writing happens, one sentence to loosen it, and then, on a good night, everything else comes tumbling out. This one formed as I pondered all the kinds of love that we encounter in this life (familiar, friendship, romantic, platonic, fleeting, steadfast, etc,.)

So, “what is love if not blue?” There’s Blue the album², but also blue the color, and Maggie Nelson’s heartache of a book Bluets. To feel love so often comes with feeling blue— it’s that all kinds of love lead to other big feelings; like the fact that you’ll one day know loss. That to love in most ways is to accept that grief will follow - not, and so hopefully not anytime soon - but that someday it will.

We miss those we love, and we get lost in love, and sometimes we have to leave a version of love far sooner than we’d like. We’re fortunate when a love is enduring, and strong, when it lasts beyond mess and mighty fuck-ups. We’ve all got those.

I have precious friendships that have taught me so much about love, even as the other kinds of love have confused me and bruised me. I’ve been loved and in love and in truth, I just feel so lucky to know that loving someone and losing them, does not diminish your capacity to love again or to love better.

I have watched a new mama look into her barely-open newborn’s eyes as the whole room filled with such big love. A love for someone who didn’t exist until a few days ago, a love that fills up entire rooms.

To watch a parent fall in love again, and trust that things will change, but for the better. To watch them be loved in return, to know that they will be okay, even just observing these kinds of love can change you, in ways you can’t always imagine.

To fall out of love, and pick yourself, pick yourself up, and remember what it feels like to be loved as you are. To let people in, despite knowing how all of this ends, is perhaps one of the stupidest, rawest, and bravest parts of being human.

These are the nights when I go listen to Joni Mitchell.

xo

Enjoy some other words, not my words, about all the wonderful ways in which people write about love:

“If it is right, it happens—the main thing is not to hurry. Nothing good gets away.”

— John Steinbeck

“You don’t love because: you love despite; not for the virtues, but despite the faults.”

— William Faulkner

“In love there are two things—bodies and words.” 

— Joyce Carol Oates

“I have learned not to worry about love; but to honor it’s coming with all my heart.” 

— Alice Walker

“Love consists of this: two solitudes that meet, protect and greet each other.” 

— Rainer Maria Rilke

some blue things I love.

SIDE ONE

"All I Want" – 3:34

"My Old Man" – 3:34

"Little Green" – 3:27

"Carey" – 3:02

"Blue" – 3:05

SIDE TWO

"California" – 3:51

"This Flight Tonight" – 2:51

"River" – 4:04

"A Case of You" – 4:22

"The Last Time I Saw Richard" – 4:15

1. If you can’t picture Emma Thompson’s heartbreaking scene from Love, Actually when you hear this song, you have some homework to do.

2. Love Is Blue is actually a total bop of a song performed by French artist Paul Mauriat. The original version is called L'amour est bleu performed by Vicky Leandros.