Learning to fall in 'like' again

My parents were watching the 10 o'clock news last night, and they were sitting close to each other on the short couch. The show was silly -- the reporter's earpiece was acting up and he sounded like a robot during a live shot. An interviewee was freaking out about an altercation he witnessed between a police officer and a suspect.

Mom and dad were talking to each other like there was nobody else in the room, and I felt a bit like an intruder from my perch on a living room chair, so I slipped out and just listened to them bantering, laughing.

It's not like I'd never heard my parents laugh. They teased each other all the time growing up, and with an audience of kids, they'd get at each others' throats. But the laughter I remember was more one-sided, more competitive, more abrasive. This was warm laughter, 30-years-of-marriage intimate laughter. And it wasn't at each other -- it was at the silliness of the 10 o'clock news.

I asked my mom today about why she and dad had started taking walks together every morning, going on day trips to explore nearby towns, drinking coffee together in the evenings. My dad hated coffee once, and he used to jog the neighborhood alone. She said she realized many couples build their lives around their kids and then realize when the kids leave for college that they have nothing in common anymore. She and dad were starting to be intentional about having fun together.

"I thought that after 27 years, I knew how to do this marriage thing," she told her Bible study group tonight, offhandedly. "And then three years ago, I finally got it."

By "getting it," I think she means liking my dad -- not as a family member, a spouse, or even as a romantic partner, but as a friend.

In romantic relationships, it's too often about love. But we've got a cramped definition of love that only permits two categories: passionate romance with its elaborate courtship, or dutiful, filial love like the kind every parent is supposed to have in equal measure for each child. Within those two categories, things can be pretty crappy. Husbands and wives can simultaneously love and barely stand each other; they can go on romantic vacations but share zero common interests and gripe about how annoying their spouse is when they share a drink with their buddies. They never get a divorce, but they never grab their bikes after work and just ride around the block together, either.

Growing up, I never doubted my parents loved each other. But I had serious doubts they actually liked each other.

I've always treasured the phrase "I like you," however juvenile it might sound. I've used it since first grade to express my interest in a boy, but I think it also captures the attraction and friendship that precedes commitment, obligation, even love itself. It says "I would be your best friend even if you weren't of the opposite sex ... but you are, and that's just a bonus." Unfortunately, "I like you" is all too fleeting once you say "I love you."

My parents aren't perfect. They still squabble and deal with baggage. But seeing them sitting close on the short couch and chattering about the 10 o'clock news gave me hope that relationships -- and people -- can change, even after 30 years.

Just between me and you, I think they like each other.