The story of L-O-V-E
The secret moments my parents kept
I’d asked my cousin to read a chapter of my manuscript and give me feedback. Two weeks later, she sent me a message with her insights. Between those two conversations, I had learnt something that made my heart melt.
I asked Dudu who exactly requested her to sing “L-O-V-E” by Nat King Cole at my mother’s 50th birthday celebration at Tshwane East Seventh-day Adventist (TESDA) Church. Her answer, in her own words, told me everything I needed to know:
So Mamkhulu Gugu asked me to sing something, I then came back to her with a vn singing 2 options, she was shocked when she heard one of them being LOVE and specifically requested that one by Nat King Cole I think it was, there were a lot of versions out there but she asked for his.
The moment I read that message, I knew my father knew. I’m certain he heard the song choices and told my mother what I was about to share with my cousin.
My mother was born in January 1965. That same month, Nat King Cole released his final studio album: L-O-V-E. The title track has since become one of his most beloved songs. Dudu didn’t realise that, while she was singing to my mother on her 50th birthday, she was also celebrating the album on the 50th anniversary of its release.
There is no way on earth my father wouldn’t have known that the album came out the same month my mother was born. That’s just the kind of man he was. As we all sat on TESDA’s lawn, clad in white, watching Dudu sing to my parents, he knew a deeper meaning was embedded in the performance — a little, private gift that he and his wife shared. That small, knowing exchange right in front of the rest of us is a testament to their kind of love.
What makes this even more poignant is the story behind the song itself. Nat King Cole recorded the album in early December 1964, just days before he was hospitalised with lung cancer. His entire left lung was surgically removed in January. His father, Rev. Edward James Coles, passed away from heart problems on 1 February.
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Throughout his illness, Cole’s publicists assured the world that he was recovering well. Billboard magazine reported that “the future looks bright for ‘the master’ to resume his career again.” But on Valentine’s Day, Nat King Cole quietly checked out of St John’s Hospital in Santa Monica to go for a drive by the sea with his wife, Maria. It was a final, brief moment of tenderness: a man spending the last of his time with the woman he loved. He died early the next morning, 15 February 1965, aged 45.
My parents would have known all of this. They shared inside jokes like this all the time.
Years later, long after my mother had passed, I saw how deeply those private moments had marked my father. He was recovering from renal failure, about four years after her death, and was referred to a wellness centre in Roodepoort. I drove him there for his introductory session and helped him from one room to the next. When the psychotherapy session began, I was already in the room, and he motioned to the therapist that my staying was fine.
The therapist asked him what he missed most about my late mother. My father paused, and then said something I will never forget. He told her that there were moments when he would forget that his wife was gone. Something funny might happen on television or out in public, and he would instinctively reach to his side to alert my mother. Then he’d look around and realise no one was there.
My parents would secretly laugh at people all the time. I keenly remember my father’s naughty chuckle, “Weh, Sthandwa” Hey, Love. The juiciest gossip follows. Their eyes light up, and they destroy the object of their fascination. Even if you’re sitting right in front of them.
I sat in that room and watched my father describe the shape of his grief: not a dramatic collapse, but a quiet turning towards someone who was no longer beside him.
That’s what I think about when I remember Dudu singing “L-O-V-E” at the birthday celebration. My father, sitting there in white, watching his wife being serenaded with a song whose secret only they understood. A small, knowing glance. A private Valentine hidden inside a public celebration.
If you have someone to spend Valentine’s Day with, hold them close and share an intimate moment. Let the world see only the surface of the deep well of love you have for that person. You may not have been born with L-O-V-E, but I pray you spend the most precious moments of your life with the people you love.
Live longer, and may your tribe increase.
