Love Floats Back to You

“Love… exciting and new…” — The Love Boat.

After 35 years? Not exactly.

And that’s okay.

I love my husband more deeply now than I ever did in the beginning. But it isn’t the fluttery, can’t-eat, can’t-sleep kind of love anymore. It’s quieter. Steadier. It’s woven into everyday life — into grocery lists and shared glances and knowing what the other person is thinking without a word being said.

Love doesn’t stay “exciting and new.” It grows roots.

This may sound cliché (and my husband rolls his eyes when I say it), but humor has carried us through so much. The inside jokes. The silly voices. The random memes sent in the middle of a workday. Those little things matter. They soften the hard edges of adulthood. They remind us not to take ourselves too seriously.

My advice to younger couples is always this: laugh together. Protect that. Life will bring enough weight on its own — careers, aging parents, children, health concerns, responsibilities. If you start treating each other like business partners managing logistics, you slowly lose something sacred. This is the person you should feel safest with. The one you can be fully yourself around — unfiltered, imperfect, human.

After 35 years, we’ve seen each other at our best and our worst. We’ve navigated disappointments, stress, growth, change. We’ve both evolved — and somehow, we’ve kept choosing each other through all of it. That feels more meaningful than “exciting and new.”

And yes, sometimes it still feels like we’re dating in college — but not because everything is sparkly and effortless. It feels that way because there’s comfort. Familiarity. A shared history that no one else holds.

Intimacy shifts, too. Maybe there’s an achy knee now or a little more fatigue than there used to be. Physical love doesn’t disappear — it just changes shape. Sometimes it’s passion. Sometimes it’s a backrub on the couch. Sometimes it’s holding hands at a restaurant and feeling completely known.

Maybe long love isn’t about fireworks.

Maybe it’s about the slow burn.

“Love, life’s sweetest reward…

Let it flow, it floats back to you.”

And after 35 years, I’ve learned — the love that floats back to you is the love you’ve tended all along.

Thanks for visiting my nest—until next time.