How do you know your in love?

As I sit here and ponder what to write in my blog I am thinking what is one question I want answered. I am the type of person that likes to look things up and do research on different subjects just so I know the answer. Of all the possibilities of things to research there is one that I bet you will never find a definite answer to. How do you know your in love? Maybe I am just so inexperienced in this department I am destined to be in the special class for this subject. Hell I don't know, I think I was in love with my first. My whole life revolved around this guy and I sat at his feet. There was nothing I mean nothing I would not have done for this man. Was that love?
I remember looking into his eyes and growing week in the knees. I remember the kisses and how I wished they would never end. By the way did I mention I was nineteen at the time and he was seven years older so maybe this was not love maybe it was just being young.
After his death I gave up on love and until recently I had been fine with out it but for some reason now I want that special feeling in my life again.
There is love now but not the love that is shared between two lovers. I love my children, I love my mother, my sister, my brothers and I love my pets. What if the love we feel for our family is the only love that really exist and the love we feel for our significant other if we are lucky enough to have one is not love at all?
What is love, is it a feeling or a way of being?
Why do we make such a big deal of it?
Why does it hurt?
As I was driving home tonight I listened to a sad song on the radio by a group called Sugarland. The woman was singing about her lover and how he was always leaving her for his wife when she called. If was sad and soulful as she sang

why don't you stay
I'm down on my knees
I'm so tired of being lonely
I'm begging you please
baby why don't you stay

Is that how you know your in love that you will beg the other person to stay?
I'm sorry I do not want anyone that I have to beg to stay with me. I want to be with someone that wants to be with me. There is such a thing as free will.

That's another thing why do people want to hold on to someone that doesn't want to be with them. You can't hold on to a heart that does not belong to you. I am in that situation now. I just want my freedom but he is holding on telling me he will never let me go. For god sake man you can't hold someone that doesn't want to be held. If he truly cared about me he would see that holding me only kills me a little each day. That's exactly why I am moving far far away. Okay I didn't want to get on that subject so back to how do you know your in love.

Then there is another song that I remember that says that she was leaving her man because she didn't want a love she could live with she wants a love she can't live without. Maybe she is not thinking so much about love but more about passion. There is another question does passion automatically come with love?

Damn the more I write the more confused I get.

All I know is I want that special person in my life that I can tell my secrets to and share my hopes and dreams. I want that person that I rush home to because I can't stand to be away longer than necessary. The person that I snuggle with on cold nights and laugh with when I tell him a funny joke. Shit I just described my dog.
It would be nice if he talked too and had a lot of interesting things to talk about.

Okay that's it I better quit while I'm ahead because now I'm really confused and wonder if I will ever be in love.