Affection, in the sense that I mean it, is a broad kind of love: a gentler, more abiding, more generous way of feeling-toward, and of seeing.
We love to love, but it can burn and blind us. The beloved is often only a slip of the heart away from becoming, Gollum-wise, my precious. Misshapen love can bind us.
Affection – for a friend, a landscape, a tool – sees clearly but generously. It is love-over time. It may begin as natural affinity or an appreciation of beauty, but it grows with use. There is a bond here, an ease that comes with familiarity, an acceptance of foible and imperfection that comes from seeing worth, and from understanding scars.
Affection looks after things, growing with each wrinkle and repair.
“Why do you live with that broken screen door?” “Because I’ve fixed it many times. I know how it sticks. I have the knack of it. It isn’t really broken.”
“Why do you love that chipped old cup?” “Because it fitted well in my hand. Because it’s my old cup. Because now my hand fits well to it.”
Because affections have history and grow out of relationship, we often receive them from others. They can be given but also seem to give themselves, sidling up unnoticed, settling lightly in our lives and gaining weight with time as the best parts of our inheritance.
“Why do you love that odd little spatula?” “It’s the thing I kept from my grandpa’s kitchen. He seemed to like it, and it’s turned out to be odd in useful ways.”
“Why do you keep that ugly little toolbox?’ “I remember who bought it for me. It’s been doing its job and ugly for a long time now.”
Shared affections and mutual affection in particular times and places make families and communities and cultures.
“Why do you love those people and those places?” “Because somehow we made each other. I’ve known them, and they’ve known me.”
Affection is the hedgerow in which love can make a nest.