Photo by Lutz Fischer-Lamprecht

Kris Kristofferson sings about lonely Sunday morning church bells echoing through the canyons like the disappearing dreams of yesterday. With that lyric he captures exquisitely a man alone on a Sunday morning, alone without even a dream.

For many, Love is the biggest dream that evaporates like echoes in the canyons. You lose Love and you are leveled. You walk around an empty town and listen to the church choir but don’t join in. You see daddies in the park with laughing children, but you can’t laugh. You smell someone frying chicken and remember long ago meals prepared with Love, but there is no Love to go home to. The clock ticks in the darkness of your bedroom and your mind tocks back empty. Alone and without Love you’re but darkness without dreams.

Let there be light.

Love is light. It opens the blinds and makes the sun rise in the east. Where there is Love there are dreams because when we are in Love, we are able to dream. The gift of dreams and being able to plan a future is among Love’s most powerful gifts. Perhaps we dream more when we’re in Love because we no longer have to spend our energy searching for the one who completes us. Perhaps we dream more because Love, like afterburners on a jet engine, kicks in more power and propels us to complete our day and dream and plan our tomorrows. Perhaps we dream more when we’re in Love because it’s now more worthwhile; after all, the happiness of another is at stake as well. Perhaps we dream more when we’re in Love because it’s more fun to dream with somebody else.

Whatever the reason, Lovers are dreamers. Dreamers live in a better world because they dream themselves there. They create the landscape. Some say dreamers view the world through rose-colored glasses as if that’s something terrible. Some say love/rose colored glasses cloud the perception of reality. I think those people are just jealous; I mean, who wouldn’t choose a nice love/rose colored outlook if they could? Besides, nonbelievers don’t realize that they could peel off pair after pair after pair of glasses, and the love/rose outlook would remain. It’s internalized. Lovers see the world as beautiful because their world is beautiful.

That’s a world a far cry from the grey city sidewalks Kristofferson sings about. So, how do we keep our Love from being dispersed by the winds and disappearing on the echoes of yesterday? How do we keep Love’s light and music? How do we keep the church bells alive and vibrant? By joining the choir, by swinging our children in the park, by frying chicken with someone we Love. Don’t wait like Scrooge for the ghosts of Love’s past. Climb the bell tower daily and ring the bells of Love. Ring them in thanks, ring them to tell our Love, and ring them again to tell the world, “I’m in Love and will keep it that way!” Keep your Love present and it can never become a haunting echo of yesterday.

What bell towers do you climb? How do you keep your Love alive and present?