The Littlest Acts of Love.

Or rather, the big ones.

It’s those early-dating jitters; you’re comfortable and relaxed, but you still hope you don’t get a piece of spinach stuck in your teeth at dinner. I had been dating my now-husband for maybe six months, but it felt longer and shorter all at the same time—a long distance relationship with the military and deployments thrown in will warp time. Long-distance requires better communication, to keep the love flowing despite not seeing each other very often. Deployments expedite the conversations that don’t normally come up right away, and also demand discussion of more morbid topics that two people dating rarely, if ever, chat about over dinner.

While my now-husband and I had already covered the hot-topic and morbid conversation pieces, the long distance left us not always knowing the little, tangible things. Like do you drum your fingers on the steering while you drive? (Thankfully, he does not). Can your hand fit into the Pringles container and reach to the bottom to get the last chip? (Much to my husband’s delight, my tiny hands do so with ease). Do you honk the horn when someone cuts you off? (I admit that I am an excessive-honker. It’s the northeastern blood in me; honking while driving is how you communicate, but apparently that is not how the rest of the country drives.)

I was visiting my now-husband in Florida, where he was currently stationed. It was a quick trip between deployments; he was deploying faster than a revolving door could spin back then. He told me he had a surprise, and we needed to dress up a bit, which piqued my interest. My eyebrows lifted as he pulled his truck into a fancy marina.

We got out of the truck and he grasped my hand as we walked towards a dinner cruise boat. He threw a side glance at me, taking in the smile on my face. “I have to admit, the only reason we’re able to do this is because they were offering free tickets through the base,” he said. I pulled him to a stop and looked him in the eye. “That doesn’t bother me at all. It means a lot that you took the time to plan this despite everything else going on.” I waved my hands through the air; “everything else” meaning his intense pilot upgrade, getting his masters degree online, and preparing for the deployment that was fast approaching.

He smiled, and we boarded the boat hand-in-hand. We wandered the top deck, taking in the ocean breeze and watched the sunset. Soon it was time for dinner, and we found ourselves at a table-for-two by the window. A waiter appeared with a loaf of bread in a basket.

We bowed our heads as he prayed over our food. He gestured towards the basket. “Which do you prefer, heel or middle slice? You pick first.” This was one of those little things we hadn’t figured out yet—bread slice preference.

“Oh, I don’t care, I’m not picky. You pick whatever you want,” I replied, although I secretly preferred not-the-heel. Again, the early-dating jitters where you are still trying to impress, just a little. The only person I know who truly loves the heel of a loaf of bread is my mom.

He responded by reaching forward and taking the heel.

My eyebrows raised in surprise. “You prefer the heel?”

He started slathering truffle butter on his slice. “No,” he said, “but I think you’d rather have a middle slice, so I took the heel.”

He was concentrating on buttering his bread, so he didn’t see my jaw drop a little. It was at that moment that I knew—this is love. A different love. A love I want to spend the rest of my life with.

//

You can show love in a million different ways. Love can be bold and grand; dramatic and expensive. That kind of love is still love, and still good—but life doesn’t always stay grand.

Life gets bogged down with bills, laundry, sleep deprivation, work, parenting, etc. The daily grind keeps us moving at warped speed, despite the effort to slow down.

Weaving little moments of love in the heartbeat of our home is what keeps our family thriving. The bigger gestures of love, like chocolate-covered strawberries on Valentine’s Day, still bring a smile to my face, and I truly appreciate it.

But it’s the frequent little tokens of love that keep our love steady.

It’s the way he preps the coffee pot for me the night before, so all I have to do is plug it in.

It’s how I heat up the breakfast sandwich I meal-prepped and hand it to him on his way out the door every morning.

It’s how he unloads the dishwasher without being asked.

It’s the way I make sure his uniforms are washed and ready.

It’s the way he grills steak for dinner, and puts the best one on my plate, not his.

It’s how I always leave a small bowl of cookie dough in the fridge when I make homemade cookies.

It’s how we show up and choose each other, over and over and over and over, in every little moment that we can.

Our love language may appear small and quiet—but it’s the small and quiet heartbeats that we hear over and over and over. It’s love showing up, day after day, week after week, year after year, in a million little ways.

It’s a continual offering of giving the better slice to the other.

And that, is the biggest act of love of all.

This post is part of a blog hop with Exhale—an online community of women pursuing creativity alongside motherhood, led by the writing team behind Coffee + Crumbs. Click here to view the next post in the series "Love."