So it’s 14 February 2021. That Hallmarked calendar day of Cupid…

And it’s 8 years since I published a book about the multi-faceted feelings and phenomena of love.

At that point in my life I’d been single for a year. The year before THAT I’d manifested a dream man, along with a whirlwind romance, marriage proposal and engagement ring.

But then the man changed his mind and that was that. Cupid dropped his quiver of arrows and shot a canon ball through my heart instead…

So I had to hurt and lick my wounds and carry on. To hide and heal and find myself.

As part of that process I felt compelled to challenge myself to be the writer I knew I had been born to be. And in thinking about how I would accomplish this, the idea to write about LOVE hit me like a thunderbolt. And not only of love like the coupledom I had lost, but in all of its’ vast and glorious complexity, weaving in and out of the multi-coloured strands of my life.

So I set out to explore love, to seek it and see it. And where ever I sought it, I found it. And as I did, I wrote it all down. It was a cathartic, joyful and expansive experience. And just like that I had written my first published book, ‘Peachey Letters.’

I can’t tell you that I’ve lived happily ever after since that time. In truth there IS no happy ending. I’ve carried on with my life. I tarried with romance again, but it was halting and shifting. And so I’ve climbed the mountains of my life, then ran down into the valleys, with family and friends, and, so often, on my own.

And I thought to myself, ‘it’s better this way. I have my OWN way, all the time.’ There will be no more heartaches or complications for me, instead I’m free, in every way, to make my own choices, without compromise. And after so many years of being this Miss, I decided, with graceful acceptance, that I couldn’t be anything other than on my own.

As I knew that love was all around and within me, I lived without regret. I didn’t need it in one romantic dimension, but to experience it in every way – whether sometimes dark and sometimes diaphanous in form.

Then COVID came and lockdown landed.

At times I felt isolated, then at others a happy hermit. And I promised myself that if someone passed through my thoughts, I’d reach out to and check in on them. In doing so I had every shade of response that can be imagined, from reconnected joy, to nonchalant indifference.

But there was an exception… One person I thought of, but wouldn’t reach out to. Someone I’d cared for in the years in between writing my book and the present day. Sadly it hadn’t worked out for us. So I could only imagine, after more years had passed, that he had moved on, would have found love. Would not want to reconnect. I was afraid of going there.

Throughout this curious time of Corona, my life continued to ebb and flow. I had tragedies, triumphs and 1000s of daily transactions.

Then one day I discovered a text I hadn’t read. It had been sent months before, but I’d only just received it, on an old device I had just happened to turn on. And it was from the very person I’d thought about, but avoided…

Then, to my surprise, after much time, many texts, walks and talks had passed, I became someone’s Valentine again, with red roses and romantic declarations.

That’s been just gorgeous. And yet, you know, it’s a day in the life, not my whole life. I feel blessed to be able to celebrate love in that way again, to add it into the mix of every conversation, realisation and transaction that goes on in my life. Because when I look for it, in every person, situation or station, all coming together in the fabric of my consciousness, love is always there.

So if you’re reading this, love could mean everything or nothing to you. You could be feeling full of it or sore for the lack of it. But know, whatever your ‘status’, that you ARE love, in so many ways: YOUR ways. You deserve love. To give and receive it. To know it is within you and around you, in everything. Red roses are truly beautiful, yet a kind word, a smile, or an act of thoughtfulness are precious acts of love beyond price, too.

And since you are all LOVE, then finally and naturally, it’s time to wish you a very Happy Valentines Day x x