Sometimes the universe doesn’t send roses. Sometimes it sends fifty half-round coping bricks, dumped unceremoniously at your feet. In the right moment, even the most ordinary objects take on peculiar significance. That’s exactly what happened to me not long ago. I found myself, quite unexpectedly, in possession of fifty coping bricks. Not flowers. Not a poetic letter. Not some antique with an obvious tale. Just fifty solid, practical pieces of building material. The more I stared at them, the more I wondered what they might really mean… In my own interpretation—love is built!
At the time, I was thinking a lot about love—about the man I feel I have a future with, and about what lasting relationships look like once you strip away the fantasy. What makes two people endure? What’s worth protecting? And why do we treat love as if it’s a finished product, hidden away somewhere, waiting to be discovered?
Then these bricks turned up. The universe, in all its dry humour, delivered not romance but building materials. The message was clear: love is built.
Symbolism in Love: More Than Roses and Hearts
We like our symbols of love soft and beautiful. Roses. Hearts. Candlelight. Silk sheets. Wedding dresses and love letters. We rarely imagine love as a brick. Yet, perhaps, a brick is the most honest symbol of love there is. On its own, a brick is unremarkable—heavy, plain, practical. But place one beside another, and then another, and slowly something appears that wasn’t there before: a wall, a home, a shelter—something that stands.
Increasingly, I find the phrase “love is built” resonating with me. The first encounter, that flash of attraction, is merely the arrival of the first brick. What matters is not the meeting, but what happens next. Building. Trust is a brick. Consistency is a brick. Intimacy, forgiveness, showing up, repairing misunderstandings—each is another brick. So are the small gestures: making a cup of tea, remembering something important, holding hands, sharing food, listening without judgement, or simply being present when there’s nothing much to say. None of it looks spectacular on its own. Yet together, these bricks build a relationship.
Why Coping Bricks Matter
What struck me most wasn’t just the presence of bricks, but their type: coping bricks. In construction, coping bricks cap the top of a wall, protecting the structure beneath from weather. The metaphor suddenly deepened. Building isn’t enough. What we build must be protected. Every relationship faces storms—uncertainty, exhaustion, work stress, family demands, illness, money worries, miscommunication. Needing space or craving closeness at different times. Bad weather doesn’t mean the wall was poorly built; it means the wall exists in the world. Anything real is exposed to the elements.
Those coping bricks weren’t a vision of perfect romance. They were a nudge about maintenance. Love is built, but it also needs looking after. The universe, it seemed, was reminding me that protection is as important as creation.
Love Is Not Something We Simply Find
There’s a colossal industry dedicated to the myth of finding love. Find your soulmate. Find your perfect match. Find the one who completes you. But love doesn’t work that way.
You might find someone with electric chemistry and build nothing lasting. Or meet someone who makes your heart race, only to discover, six months in, that you can’t actually talk to each other. Sometimes, the real foundation is laid quietly, over time: the seemingly insignificant, cumulative acts that don’t look like much until you notice you’re standing on something solid.
This is the heart of why love is built is such a vital idea. The universe rarely hands us a completed picture. Sometimes it just provides the raw materials. What we make of them is up to us. No one arrives bearing a finished future. Instead, two people bring their histories, their habits, their flaws and strengths, and try to construct something together. Love isn’t a house you move into; it’s a building site, a work in progress.
A Project, Not a Coincidence
The Hearth and Hestia
Why fifty bricks? I still don’t know. But the abundance was what mattered. One brick could be a fluke. Fifty was enough to actually make something. It felt like the universe was being playful, offering not a romantic symbol but a construction kit. Here I was, contemplating love and the future, and instead of a delicate metaphor, I got enough masonry to keep me busy for weeks. Subtle, it was not.
In Ancient Greek tradition, the home’s centre was the hearth, sacred to Hestia, goddess of the hearth, home, and domestic life. I’ve always loved what Hestia represents. She isn’t about the thrill of pursuit, but about what happens after—the warmth that persists, the rituals that turn a house into a home. We celebrate beginnings: first kisses, first nights, first declarations. But Hestia’s domain is the continuation. Someone must tend the fire. Someone must maintain what’s been built. The strongest relationships, I suspect, become like that hearth: not always blazing, but always warm enough to come home to.
The Man and the Bricks
The man I care about isn’t a builder, which makes the symbolism even funnier. The bricks didn’t arrive because of some shared plan or discussion. Their meaning was all in the timing. I’d been thinking about how to build something lasting with another person—and then, suddenly, the tools to build appeared.
Symbols are personal. A robin might mean nothing to one person, yet remind another of a loved one lost. A song can bring back a whole summer. A scent can resurrect a vanished room. We give objects meaning because we encounter them in the context of our stories. These bricks entered mine at precisely the right moment, and I paid attention.
Signs From the Universe: Not Predictions, But Invitations
I don’t believe that signs from the universe are predictions. Sometimes, they’re just prompts to pay attention. A symbol can break our habitual thinking. It can help us see things from a different angle. The message I found in those bricks wasn’t that this man is definitely my future. It was something far more useful: if you want something lasting, be prepared to build it. That’s the truth, whoever stands beside us. Attraction alone can’t sustain a relationship. Nor can fantasy or promises. Eventually, someone has to lay the bricks. Both people do. And once something precious exists, both need to protect it from the inevitable weather.
Choosing to Build Something That Lasts
This is why I’m no longer interested in the myth of perfect love. I want something real. Something imperfect but consciously constructed. Something where, occasionally, bricks go in the wrong place, get noticed, laughed about, and then repositioned. Something that can withstand a little rain. The older I get, the more I see that elegance lies in quiet maintenance. We mend what we value: our clothes, our furniture, our gardens, our photographs. Why should love require less care than anything else we call precious?
Symbolism in love doesn’t always arrive beautifully packaged. Sometimes it’s dusty, heavy, and takes both hands to carry. Sometimes, it arrives fifty times over. I still don’t know what exactly will be built from this chapter of my life. Maybe I’m not supposed to know. But I know what those coping bricks came to mean.
Love is built, not found. It starts with materials: trust, time, affection, patience, honesty, consistency, intimacy. It continues with two people willing to keep building. And when the storms come, as they always do, perhaps they’ll learn how to protect what they’ve created.
Because bricks—and love—are meant to build something that lasts.
