just two strangers on a beach

    I've written here before about my theories about "grand gestures"--going out of one's way to let one's feelings be known to another. I appreciate the indulgence of those who have also listened to my ruminations on the subject at other times. I hadn't put my finger on where it all came from: the origin of my feelings about the subject, my great desire to write about it, the vehemence of my opinion.
    It finally made its way into my consciousness today, this morning, while I contemplated another change to the living space. I need to take some pictures off the walls, maybe add some new ones. For the first time in a long time, I really looked at one thing that's been hanging on my wall next to my bed for a long time. This (click for detail):
Or, more accurately, this:
    It appeared in the Chicago Tribune Magazine just after Independence Day around 2002, I think. Something about the photograph struck me at the time, and I cut it out, but I knew that there was something wrong with my interest in it; it revealed something that I had to keep hidden. I took the picture to work with me, put it in a folder and shoved it into a drawer. It remained there for a while, maybe a year or more? Eventually, I found it again and hung it up at work. It was just an odd part of my peripheral consciousness. After the separation and divorce, I found myself with an excess of picture frames, so it made its way into a frame and onto the wall. Something about it soothed me and vaguely excited me at the same time.
    This morning, it really hit me: this is it--this is the grand gesture. The "I have to show you how I feel, even at the risk of failing spectacularly" moment. These two, who apparently barely knew each other, chucked all sense for a weekend on the road, just to see the fireworks. They slept on the beach.
    Before, when I tried to explain it, the Grand Gesture ended up sounding (and feeling, wrongly) like "proof of greater love." The other person risking everything to prove that they feel more.
    Because I thought that I wanted to be the one who was loved more than I loved.
    And really, how likely is that? And if I had it, would I want it? I don't think so, either.
    Contemplating that picture this morning, though, I realized that I'd been thinking about it, and explaining it, all wrong. It's not proof of greater love--it's evidence of reciprocal feeling that I want. Have always wanted. Still want. It's not about being the recipient of mind-blowing gifts, or meaningful letters, or even a haiku written and rewritten over and over until it's perfect. It's about giving and taking those standout moments. Taking and making the phone calls. Giving kick-ass back rubs and getting kick-ass foot rubs. Buying dinner...and having dinner bought for me.
    Sometimes the grandest of the gestures are missed while one is doing something else at the time--something like living, just getting by. And when you realize you've missed them, they're all the sweeter, all the more "grand" because they were done, and missed, and the one who bothered also was able to let them go without fanfare. Because it's about you--and not about the response.
    Sometimes the grandest gestures are the ones you'd planned to make, but never had the chance. But only a fool doesn't take that chance.