And They Lived Happily Ever After

St. Valentine's Day was just a couple days ago. I could talk about love and romance and hearts and relationships, but I don't really feel like it, and it's not like I'm qualified to talk about any of that either. So anyways, I thought about those romance or chick flick movies that can often make a person get emotional or even tear up.

Now from time to time I have become a victim of these stories of broken hearts and repaired hearts and other things of that matter, and have been on the verge of getting a little bit emotional...maybe. But I beg to ask a question: What makes us get so emotionally involved in such trivial matters? Sure, a person doesn't profess their love for someone else every day of the week, but either in happiness or sadness, why are our heartstrings tugged so much that we ourselves feel a part of the moment?

That happens with human interest stories on television as well. You see a story of a man throwing away his life of drugs and reckless living to save his own children on a 60 Minutes special. Or watching an ESPN special where a mentally challenged child becomes a part of a football team by being a manager. Even in my own high school, a young man who was a manager for years was given a standing ovation at my high school after receiving 3 medals in the Special Olympics.

Even picturing those stories, especially when you know the person, can bring out emotions you didn't even know you had. I realize there's a difference between a movie where people find lost love and the Special Olympics, but nonetheless we feel those emotions because of how we ourselves can relate to those situations.

They are feel-good stories...an example of the goodness in the world, which can be a cold place. The beauty of the Grace of God is that He is with us both in those good places and cold ones. He wants us to feel those emotions. It shows that we are human. It's not easy being numb to everything that happens around us. Sure, some people cry more easily than others, I'd be the first to admit that.

You look at the love stories in movies, and it's not exactly common for someone to go on a plane to catch someone before they get married like in The Wedding Singer. But maybe in our lives, that will be a car or a train, (hopefully we won't need to do something that drastic), but it's possible. Sometimes God's plan is what we may think is crazy. The road isn't always straight...kind of like the Rascal Flatts song "God Bless the Broken Road." It can be scary, but maybe we can have our own movie-like script to something remarkable happening in our own lives, whether that's tutoring someone to do something remarkable or doing it ourselves.

So, there's nothing wrong with watching a chick flick or two, even myself can be caught doing that from time to time. I think it's good for a person to see and feel that every so often.

Now I'm no George Clooney, but God's road for me has been fascinating thus far, and hopefully in addition to my own I can help someone else find their fairy tale ending.