Introducing The Language of Love. Also? On Introductions.

I'm not blogging on my regular day this month. There's a reason why, too...

The first part of the reason is just...silliness. I got my days completely mixed up last week, and thought my blogging day was the first of February, instead of one of the last days in January. So I thought I had to introduce this month's topic...and I had no idea what to say.

When I figured out my mistake...I realized that I wanted to take a peek at what other people had to say about this topic before I posted.

And then, poor Kimberly was sick and asked people to take over for her today. Since I missed my day on Wednesday, I volunteered.

and realized I was stuck. The first person to post on this month's topic.

Which is:

The Language of Love. 

It looks pretty, doesn't it? But I'm not really sure what to say. I mean, I could ask you to try to convince me that Italian isn't the sexiest-sound language in the world. Or I could do some research into the fact that Tolkien created his own linguistic system, and wrote his books...around that. (A method I really can't wrap my head around. I mean...man must have been eighteen shades of brilliant.)

Fortunately, since I'm just doing the introduction, I can also pass the buck :D Everyone else will bring their own idea to the table, their own interpretation of what the language of love means and how it applies to them in the context of our blog. (No pressure, guys!)

I will leave my own small contribution, though, because otherwise, I'm likely to find myself cleaning the Dunvegas toilets or something.

The past two weeks, I've been reading this very interesting book: What Every BODY is Saying, by Joe Navarro. (That link will take you to Amazon.com to check it out. This is not an affiliate link.) Anyway, Joe has mastered reading body language, and shares some of the more universal tells and signals that people will use.

In my Real Life, I've never been great at reading people. I trust too much on their words, and not enough on their behaviour. My dad on the other hand? He's been brilliant at it his whole life.

In my writing life, I recently (re)read a scene a friend of mine had written. I couldn't get over how she cued the READER into things that the point-of-view character was so. completely. oblivious to. And she did it by using body language. Body language that the reader could interpret, but the character couldn't.

And yet...with all that said, I'm still going to have to admit that verbalization is still my language of love. When my husband brings me chocolate when he knows I've had a bad day, I know that's an expression of love, but it isn't quite complete without an "I love you" to go with it.

Still, it's nice to have some tools to decipher the subtext of the language of love...