If your home is your castle, then most folks are under siege. A steady barrage of media infiltrates every day, and no part of the house is sacred. Wait—there has to be some sacred square foot, right? No, even the hallway closet has surplus Christmas paper waiting for you to wrap up some consumer products to show someone how much you care.

Your television, which you say you hardly ever watch, stays on about fourteen hours a day. You TiVo® shows you miss and can have conversationsabout at least two prime time programs. Your cell phone has a distinctive ring so you can know when to reach for it in a crowd. The radio in the car stays on, and there are always CDs or an MP3 player when the stations aren’t playing anything worthwhile. You have to check your email. Soon. No one has written you by hand this month, but the several trees’ worth of catalogs and solicitations are piled up.

Build a spot exclusively for creating closeness between you and your partner. Make it a peaceful place, but give yourself permission to make noise in it. Make it a place that reflects your relationship’s unique values. Start making it right now.

You’ll want an area big enough for two people to move about, but no bigger. Moving, in this context, means massaging, rolling, wrestling, and frolicking. It would be great to have the ability to stand up and dance, but it’s far more important to be able to feel cozy when holding each other tight. Spare bedrooms, attics, alcoves, tree houses, tents, and basement corners make marvelous sacred spaces.

Sacredness is defined by the way you treat the space, not the size of the space. Apartment dwellers can create wonderful spaces under a loft bed or by using the idea of a rapid transition space. Keep an extra-large suitcase with the supplies mentioned above together with several comfortable old quilts and enough fabric to completely transform a corner and a couch into a place just for magic.

To suggest that an extraordinary relationship can be had cheaply and effortlessly is immoral. To suggest that it can flourish in competition with children or media is naïve. Creating a space exclusively dedicated to you and your partner will cost both money and time, but expending more time and creativity will allow you to spend less money, and demonstrating that you have space for each other is nearly as essential as proving you have time for one another. Think about the appeal of a coastal inn, a ski chalet or a meditation garden. Think about how badly people want to be regulars at the mountains or the shore. The difference between the tidewater B & B and the reconfigured attic lies in the availability. When ordinary moments—perfectly normal Thursday afternoons—feel like weekend getaways, then you are breathing the air of poets and prophets. Inhale deeply.