I Honestly Love You

@veryken Whether ONJ is sweet or innocent is not something one can determine from just hearing her sing this or any song. Olivia was not a song writer and did not write "I Honestly
Love You". What she is , is a fantastic interpreter of the songs of others. Who knows what she is really like other than her friends and family. Peter Allen is the songwriter and he wrote it in memory of a situation tha occurred while he was married to Liza Minelli. He had worked with Liza's mother Judy Garland who fixed the 2 of them up. But there was something he never told them which is that he was Gay. And while married to Liza he fell in love with a friend of his who like him was also Gay and Married to a Woman. It isn't clear if he ever told his friend but he and Liza were Seperated after less than 3 years of marriage and divorced after 6. He may have. The song is not about the response he received but the emotions that made him want to say something. Looking at it that way lines like "we both know I've got somewhere else to go" & "There you are with Yours and here I am with Mine" make far more sense. Far from being innocent the song is about complex emotions like loving 2 people simultaneously. Yet realizing that the other person's happiness may be more important than your new found feelings of love. The emotion is noble but not necessarily innocent. It is not spelled out because doing so would make the song's meaning only apply to a small niche group of people instead of feeling universal as it does. The Song and probably Olivia too is far deeper than it appears at face value. Appearances may or may not be deceiving.

@Drnash1221 I'm certain your mother told you this with much emotion and it may have applied to a situation she was once in.But Peter Allen wrote the song about his own experience of being Married to Liza Minelli & being in love with another Man who like him was married. Hence lines like "There You are with Yours and here I am with Mine" that do not apply to the situation you describe. It was written and recorded as a demo with Peter singing it more than 3 months before it was a hit for Olivia Newton John.