“Love doesn’t just sit there, like a stone; it has to be made, like bread, remade all the time, made new.” — Ursula K. Le Guin

My bride and I went out to dinner with old friends over the weekend. We hadn’t seen the two couples we met with in some time so there was some catching up to do before we got down to what each is planning for the future. I fancy myself a good listener, and delighted in the company of some exceptional listeners who sought to hear what each party was saying and not simply waiting for a break to jump in with their own take on the world. I delight in a conversation with a person who seeks first to understand, and I do my best to be that person myself.

Once you’ve raised children together, gone through the succession of jobs and pets and cars and appliances and hobbies that all had their day, we look around and see that the person who’s been there through all of it is still patiently waiting for us to finish stating an opinion they’ve heard us state a hundred times. It may occur to us in such moments that we’ve been every bit as complicated to live with as they have been for us. A long-term relationship is an investment, shared and nurtured equally.

We put energy into today, that tomorrow we are stronger together. All those fatal flaws that every one of us bring to a relationship are discovered, wrested with and navigated beyond on a course to better. Each day is an encounter with a new version of the person we wanted to spend the rest of our lives with, who’s looking at the latest version of us and deciding what to do with that discovery. Together we grow into something similar, but entirely new.

The magic is in the rediscovery of that old familiar spark, still burning under the layers of days together. Some days it’s easier to find that spark than other days, but it’s hiding there somewhere, waiting for the fuel and oxygen it needs. So many relationships peter out for neglect, smothered under layers of indifference. Each day is our chance to rekindle and reinvent, to remake and make new. Our future together depends on it.