Words.

Okay guys, this is pretty much a follow-up post. But. Whatever.

I know I need to chill. I do realize this. Thankfully, I have SupaKev to put things back into perspective. And, ya know, Tripp. (Tripp, today was one of those times when I wished that we communicated over more than just the occasional blog posts. You seem to understand Chris better than I do.)

Anyway, Five Love Languages.

http://www.amazon.com/Love-Languages-Secret-That-Lasts/dp/0802473156/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1326868652&sr=1-1

Brief overview, there are five languages of love. Each person speaks one more 'fluently' than another, so to speak. (Oh punny.) We all speak them all. They are Words of Affirmation, Quality Time, Physical Touch, Acts of Service, and Gift Giving. We each 'speak' and 'receive' a specific language- usually they are the same, but sometimes they're not.

As Tripp pointed out, Chris is one of those Quality Time people. I am one of those Words of Affirmation people. Well, okay, I might actually be a Physical Touch person, but that particular love language has been spoken enough that I'm moving on to my 'secondary' language. Either way, words are huge for me. I frequently tell my friends and the people I care about that I love them, and I like to hear it. A lot. To be honest, one of the underlying causes of my self esteem issues is the fact that my parents are not 'words' people. My parents express their love for me by acts of service, and gift giving. To me they're telling me over and over in, say, Finnish, that they love me, but I don't speak Finnish all that well. I speak Gaelic (words of affirmation) really well though, and a lot of the times my parents 'spoke Gaelic' to me, it was degrading. Now, imagine how that makes me feel. In their minds they are telling me VERY LOUDLY how much they love me, and occasionally very quietly the things they don't love. But because I really only understand the language in which they're telling me they don't love me, that's all I'm getting. Yeah. Not good. (This is actually one of the reasons I think I'm primarily physical touch. My parents are the least touchy people in the universe. Or close to it. And I don't legitimately feel like they love me. I know they do. But I don't feel it.)

Anyway, to me, Chris is pretty much shouting at me in oh, Swahili, that he loves me. I speak Swahili, in fact that's probably how I express myself the most (particularly in this relationship- "I miss you like crazy, I'll be there in 45 minutes" at 10 pm much?) but it's not my native language, so it feels a little foreign to me. Remember, I speak Gaelic. Don't get me wrong, it's not like he doesn't tell me he loves me. (He does, a lot. I like it, a lot.) But when he speaks negatively... that's a lot more detrimental for me. For example, "Do whatever you want." To Chris, this means, "I'm trying to be a hands-off boyfriend and let you make your own decisions." But to me, the native Gaelic speaker, it essentially says, "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn."

Can you understand how a bit of negativity can be extremely detrimental to me? And how guys, who generally don't speak Gaelic, tend to cut and run?

Me, the one who spends all of my time gushing about Chris all over my blog (in Gaelic), the one who fell in love with a boy after reading his blog (let's be honest, I really did), the one who writes letters (and, unfortunately, blog posts) when she's upset because that's how she expresses herself best... reads the blog, sees a few shall we say "Honorable Mentions (in Gaelic)" and then an entire paragraph about arguing... You might as well have slapped me in the face.

I know, I need to chill.

As SupaKev pointed out, for someone who doesn't speak Gaelic as his native language, Chris does a pretty good amount of 'gushing.' It's just hidden, because it's not in my dialect of Gaelic. (Yeah, I went there! You have to remember that freshman year I was a linguistics major.)

Anyway, I'll wrap this up with a moment of direct-to-Chris. I'm sorry. I get frustrated. Words are a big deal. I stress about them. I tell you I love you all the time because I just can't express it enough. Just... maybe try to speak a teeny bit more Gaelic on the blog? Just a teeny bit? Also... please try to remember what "Do whatever you want" means to me.

I love you.