What is love?

About 2 weeks ago, our baby chicks arrived and I despite having my own chick to keep me occupied, I'm still enjoying the daily task of taking care of them. Last night, while watching a movie, I realized that I'd forgotten to check on the chicks one last time. I wanted to make sure their water was full and the heat lamps were on. It was beginning to storm and I figured I'd better get to it before it really let loose. Much to my surprise, I was not the only thing checking on the baby chicks. Under the table in the garage was a big, fat, ugly opossum. Opossums are really, really UGLY. Did I mention he was big? Anyways, he saw me about the same time I saw him. We've had some trouble in recent months with our laying hens and opossums and I didn't want my baby chicks to fall into the same fate. Inside I went...with some big, fat raindrops beginning to fall and lightning lighting my way as I made my way from the garage to the house. Nick was all kicked back upstairs watching tv. The conversation went as follows:
Me: Um, Nick.
Him: Yeah.
Me: There's a big, fat opossum in the garage with the baby chicks.
Him: Ok. (pause) What did you want me to do about it? (I presume that he had already noted the less than desirable weather outside).
Me: Well, can't you go out there and scare it off or something?
Him: (sigh) Ok. (probably inwardly cursing me and my little chicken hobby).
It's important to note that by this time, the heavens had opened, and it was pouring cats and dogs outside.
I heard him go down to the basement and I presumed he got the shotgun as well as his boots. I settled back onto the sofa and resumed my movie watching. After about 10 minutes or so...I hadn't heard the gun and I hadn't heard Nick come back in. I wondered what was going on, so I decided to go check on him. He would have heard me coming, if it wasn't for the raging thunderstorm and it wasn't until I realized I'd just startled a man holding a gun did I think that maybe that wasn't such a good idea. He'd reinforced the tub with the chicks by holding down the screen top with some shelving that used to be in the old kitchen. The opossum wasn't there... and rather than taking a quick glance and coming back in, Nick was being thorough in his search.
So, to answer the question posted above- what is love? Love is...going out in a torrential downpour to check on your wife's baby chickens (technically, they're Melvin's...but I'm kind of attached to them already) and save them from big, ugly opossums when what you'd rather be doing at 10:30pm is watching tv. THAT is what love is.
Which is why I didn't say anything about the muddy bootprints on the kitchen landing.
I (and the baby chicks) LOVE YOU, NICK!