Love? Bah. Humbug!
OK. So. We set aside one day a year to celebrate that most beautiful of human experiences, that most exquisite gift, that sweetest of emotions: love.
I gotta tell ya, people, this year I’m a bit disappointed. Not because I’m once again single on the biggest romantic event of the year. No.
It’s the Bah! Humbug! All the Scrooge McLove I’m hearing.
Come on folks. Really? Do you think I need to be reminded that I shouldn’t be waiting all year for this day to show the depth of my feeling to those I love? Does Love really care if greeting card companies, florists, chocolatiers and helium suppliers make it large for a week or so? Does it really make for an awful day if you can’t get into your favourite restaurant because you neglected to reserve your favourite table a month ago? Do you really think the primary motivation for men today, what we’re all trying to buy with chocolate hearts and roses, is a piece of ass?
Thank you, all of you, for scrooging up Valentine’s Day.
We set aside one day of the year to celebrate love. It’s not the one day of the year we express love. The cards, flowers, chocolates and floaty balloons are gestures. Celebratory party favours.
The real point of the holiday is to take a little extra joy in acknowledging and expressing the love we feel for others in our lives. Even better: just celebrate the miracle of love itself. It’s the one thing about being human that makes everything else that happens to us in life, no matter how awful, worth the task of living. No. More than that. It makes life beautiful. It brings grace into our grasp, into our hearts, into our being.
So, for that multitude of cynics whose unloving efforts have crashed upon my shores today, I have this.
I LOVE YOU
Unconditionally.
It can be difficult, here and there, throughout the year, to maintain this feeling of love. But we manage. Often through some real hardship. Even today, I have a dear friend whose husband is nursing his father through his final days. Possibly his final hours. She brought a box of chocolates to him, today. Probably a card. She’s a much better writer than I am. I’m sure she found something brilliantly loving to write. I’m sure she found some way to express the depth of her love to him, on this day of days to be faced with the mortality of those we love. And perhaps, even today, she’s brought some grace into her husband’s life.
Maybe all that she has to give is the power of her love. Sometimes all we have is the touch of a loved one.
Love is heartbreaking sometimes.
So when you’re given a day to celebrate love, my beautiful friends, and the world’s not crashing down around you on that day… Dear Cupid, people. Celebrate it!
Beautifully written….such a simple message – show the ones you love that you do! It doesn’t take much. The flowers and chocolates are secondary. It’s the small things….like that touch on the shoulder, the smile across the table, the door held open. No, it doesn’t take that one day to remind us, but just to reinforce, and acknowledge. The date is just a gentle reminder of love….to love and be loved
Thanks, Karen.
I didn’t really understand what had me all riled up about this.When I began writing this, I hadn’t thought of the connection between what was happening with my friend and Valentine’s Day, how devastatingly heartbreaking it was to be happening on a day so many people were thoughtlessly disdaining.