IMO Romance is doing something (or sometimes saying something) that costs you which is designed to win someone’s heart and shows they REALLY matter to you above all others. A demonstration of love, passion, chivalry, self sacrifice.

The best way to experience some romance is to give some.

For example… a woman has had a hard week at work and her husband wants to help her destress, so he puts on some cliche sappy music, lights candles, makes ready a bath and some champagne (effort)… then she comes home and he leads her in, blinded, then proceeds to show her everything and spend the rest of the evening helping her relax (time)(the display, of course, being that she can tell her put time and effort into this). In doing this, she feels special and has a much better evening.

Really, romance CAN be cliche (as I just produced an example of, but it’s 5 am so you can’t blame me) but it doesn’t have to be. It’s about those 3 things, because if a person is willing to put a lot of work (effort) and their time into something so that it shows (display) then it means they obviously care enough about you to do it. *That* is romance.