bilingual

"Am I beautiful?" "Do you love me?" "Do you miss me?"

I found myself asking my husband these questions at the beginning of deployment, and not so subtly. Everything that I thought communicated love was stripped away. There were no hugs, no kisses, or any sort of touches. There were no dates, no dinners, and no laughter shared. I was practically begging for him to "voice" his affection because he wasn't here to show it to me. My baffled husband, in a much more subtle way, basically said, "I married you, didn't I? I'm faithful, aren't I? I wouldn't have married you if I didn't think you were beautiful or if I didn't love you or if I didn't want to be with you." I knew he was absolutely right. What greater expression of love is there than to be faithfully committed to another? My head knew that, yet my heart was still desperately hungry.

A few months into his deployment, he had to change locations which meant that communication would be cut off for anywhere from a week to a month. He was planning on sending me a box of some things he didn't want to transport to his new location and I had asked him to put a letter in the box so that I'd have something when all communication was gone. We were expert letter-writers when he was in Basic Training. He would write a couple pages each week. Some letters were just a run down of the things happening during his training, while others were romantic and sappy. I didn't care either way; just "hearing" his voice was enough for me. I obsessively checked the mail and holed up in my room every time I got a precious letter. I wanted to have a little bit of that romance and excitement to hang onto when we were in a period of forced silence.

He told me he had sent the box and there was a little something in there for me. I was again was obsessively checking the mail. It finally arrived and I practically ran home. Like a kid on Christmas morning, I ripped the box open with much gusto. CDs, DVDs,... but... where was my letter? I shook out every piece of newspaper and bubble wrap hoping my precious letter would float into my lap. Nothing. Maybe he was sneaky and put it inside a CD case, I thought. I searched and searched and searched; there was nothing of the sort to be found. Not even a sticky note with one sentence on it. But there was "a little something" in there for me. He bought me a cute stuffed camel and a beautiful carved elephant, my favorite animal. It was a thoughtful gift, so why was I feeling so... disappointed?

I didn't even want to acknowledge to myself that I felt that way because I knew I was being ridiculous. He saw something, thought of me, and used his spending money to buy it for me. He gave me something tangible, I could literally hold it in my hands. It was his way of saying, "I love you." It was then that I realized I was only well-versed in one language: mine. I had read Gary Chapman's popular book about love languages, yet I was painfully unaware of how limited in the linguistics of love I really was. I was disappointed because I didn't get something that I would have used to communicate affection. Which is a huge mistake to make because I was not understanding how he was communicating, at least not in my heart. My head understood that the gift was personal and thoughtful, but it didn't resonate in my heart, at least not in that moment.

I had to learn a new language: his. I had to become bilingual. I had to understand that even though he wasn't saying exactly what I wanted to hear, he was at least talking. He took the time to ask about my day even though he was exhausted, dirty, homesick, and had his life threatened hours ago and couldn't even talk to me about it. He only had enough free time to basically eat and shower, but he still waited in line to use the computers or phone. He felt like we were running out of things to talk about and that conversations became a bit forced, yet he didn't close himself off completely to me. Now I love that little elephant. I trace my fingers around the artist's details and think of how he once had it in his hands, and I feel closer to him. My favorite animal, decorated in my favorite colors, given to me by my favorite man; it is an expression of his uniquely personal love language, one that I'm studying frantically as to not miss a single word he says.