Thoughts on Valentines' Day

Thoughts on Valentines’ Day

It used to be about stalking around the neighborhood, knocking on doors and leaving store bought Valentines, then running and hiding in the bushes to watch the recipient come out and pick it up. It provided more fun than it should have. For my good friends, candy would be stuffed in the envelope. And for my best friends, a big chocolate kiss. It meant covering a shoebox with pink paper and cutting a slot into the top. It meant coming home from school with so many Valentines that the lid wouldn’t stay on. It meant laying out all the cards in the living room, taking out the candy, seeing if anyone wrote an extra sweet message along with their name. It meant sorting out the favorites either by the person who gave it or the cutest cards. 

I’ve really only had two actual boyfriends in my life, and I married the second one. The first one broke up with me on Valentines. I did not see it coming. I was expecting an extra nice Valentine date. Maybe even dinner, so when he said he wanted to see me, instead of saying let’s go out, I should have figured it out. But I didn’t have much experience. I was the wallflower that stood alone at the dances, both dreading and hoping that someone would ask. Dreading because I was awkward, shy, and didn’t know how to dance. And yet hoping, because there had to be a reason everyone seemed to think boys were the greatest. The lack of positive experiences with the opposite gender, left me wondering. Having only brothers who ignored me at best and picked on me at worst had taught me to wither rather than shine. 

Then the very next year, I was in a quick, but serious romance. And on Valentine’s Day Mick asked me to marry him. I saw it coming. We both knew we were in love and knew we wanted to be together 24/7. It didn’t matter what we did, as long as we were together. He was doing his student teaching at the time, and it was fine with me if we sat on the floor of his apartment and graded papers together, or reserved a room at the USU library and watched a film—pre video days. So when he got down on his knee in my apartment, I was giddy with excitement. No more agonizing goodbyes at night. Because after we married we could be together—forever. I wouldn’t recommend to others to marry your second boyfriend. I would always tell them that they need to get as much experience as possible. I would always tell them to make sure they’ve dated at least a year, instead of a few months. I would tell them to learn as much as you can about the person, see them in every situation. I would tell them to be cautious.

But sometimes you just know.