WAYT: Valentine's Day Fanatics

Frank and I do not celebrate Valentine’s Day.  In the past, even as recently as two years ago, we always made a point to mark the occasion in a particular way.  He is (and I will still say is, even though we don’t celebrate anymore) the king of creative ideas. 

One year, he bought me one of those giant cards and wrote me a poem on cut out hearts that he glued onto the giant card.  One year, when I was living in DC, he bought a pack of kid’s Valentine’s, personalized and numbered them, and sent them to me in a box, so I had to open them in numerical order to read his message to me.  Another year, when I was really into that season of The Bachelor, he laid out rose petals leading into the house and at the end, asked me if I would accept the rose. 

He’s a peach!  Remembering those gifts makes me smile and catch my breath, even years later. 

But now we realize that as a married couple, our relationship isn’t about marking a day with frivolous gifts just because the rest of the world does.  It’s about knowing we have something special every day, and making time to recognize that spontaneously or on any date of our choosing. 

We could be better at that.  I could be better at that. 

The thing about my memories of Frank’s gifts is that I never asked him to do any of that.  I was so wowed because he got creative, and all on his own!  I wonder what are you thinking, people who place insane pressure on your significant others to celebrate Valentine’s Day?  Don’t you think that you’d rather have a significant other who wanted to show you what you mean to him/her all the time?  Rather than be bullied into it by your incessant hint-dropping?  Or your neurotic need to tell everyone about what your person did for you on Valentine’s Day? 

I’m not just saying this because everyone else says it, I’m saying it because it’s true: Valentine’s Day is a commercial holiday.  It used to mean something, eons ago.  It used to mark something having to do with history.  I don’t even feel like Googling it to find out the real reason for the holiday; it’s pointless now.  Because that real reason is now hopelessly lost in Consumerism. 

Of course, there are couples who use the date as a special occasion.  No one drops hints, no one throws a fit to get their way.  Personally, I am always more impressed by the couples who have sweet stories to tell all the time.  That shows dedication.  If Walgreens tells me to buy candy and that’s the only time I wake up enough to think of Frank, then I’m missing my life as it flashes by, unmarked and unsweetened. 

I’m lucky because I know that Frank would do those Valentine’s Day things for me any day.  He used to make the effort to mark Valentine’s Day, but nothing would stop him now if he felt like sending me a sweet note on a random Wednesday.  He is known to make a shopping trip and come home with pretty flowers, just to show me he was thinking of me. 

I’m going to celebrate Valentine’s Day this year by digging out my memories box to look back on those past gifts.  Memories are a gift too, you know?  And not just newly created, prompted, scripted or otherwise expected memories.