A few people wrote to ask if a big fight between my wife Cat and me is what caused me to pen True Love: The Cruise Ship That Can't Stay Afloat.

I totally appreciate any concern ever shown me by any of my readers---it's just the sweetest thing---but can you imagine? First you publish a major love paean to your spouse (um, in this case being You Want Me To Emote About My Wife? Fine! Here It Is!), and then you get into a fight with said spouse, and so then you write a post about how love is like a rotting ship that can only rust and sink?

Wait. I could actually see myself doing that.

Yikes. That's awful.

I should really quit blogging right now.

Anyway, that's not what happened in this case. You know why I wrote the "Love Stinks" follow-up to my post about how happily married I am? Because I know a lot of people aren't happily married, and I didn't want to leave those people out. I hate it when people---and especially people who are in any public or (shudder) professional way Christian---act like their lives are perfect, like they exist on a plane of spiritual and emotional fulfillment that regular people can look up to, but aren't quite privileged or disciplined enough to reach. That's [bad two-syllable word], every time. Everyone has an entire half of them that's a full-on crazed werewolf. Every pastor, priest, spiritual "leader," cultural avatar, celebrity, talk show host, book author  ...  everyone. No one is wise and together and insightful and divinely inspired; no one gets to eradicate the half of them that's evil. Oprah is a snarky ego-maniac who believes her gas smells like perfume. Angelina Jolie is an emotionally retarded attention-junkie. The Dalai Lama can't spell Dalai Lama.

Everyone is exactly half-fixed, and half-broken---period; that's it; no other formula exists for being human. (Which is why we need God---but that's a whole other conversation.) Some people just have better P.R., or are better liars---or, quite often, simply dare to delude themselves into believing that others are too dense to see them for how they really are.

Whatever. I have no interest in the facade people are forever constructing around themselves. I'm interested in how people really are. And then I'm interested in how they manage to do what is easily the most difficult, noble, and valuable thing any human can do, which is to fully love and be loved by another human being.

To love and be loved is our honor and challenge. So I thought the least I could do was acknowledge the "challenge" part of that truth, and maybe talk about it a bit.

Comment here.