I can't believe I found my blog! Man, I'm a slacker. I found it because it came up in a Facebook memory... for my Valentine's Day post back in 2012! That was forever ago. I would have never remembered what it was called or how to get back into it.
So! Should I try this again? I have lots of great rants built up that never made it to Facebook. I might also copy/paste my favorite Facebook rants from over the years and post them here, to cringe at later on.
For today, I'll just update with another Valentine's Day message.
I hope you make this year's day of love a good one. My 17 year old son says all his friends are following the trend of calling it "Single Awareness Day." One of his friends even passed out Kleenex packets as valentines at school on Friday. Get it? So they can wipe their tears and commiserate together. Children, please. You're in high school. You SHOULD be single. Oy, were we that trivial back in our day? Don't answer that.
The point is, you never have to be "single" when it comes to real love. Romance is different than real love, yes. And I know Valentine's Day is traditionally about romantic love, and even marriage. But you can have a Valentine without all that. Anyone who thinks of you and cares about you is your Valentine. This day can be just a simple celebration of love and friendship. I gave my kids their valentines this morning, and it was definitely simple. A little card, a heart-shaped treat, some conversation hearts, and two blow-pops for each. No big deal. But it marks the day and reminds them that they are not actually alone. No need for Kleenex. Put it away, son.
Today also happens to be Sunday. The Lord's Day! More reasons to love it. Back when I was the primary chorister at church, I would always do something fun for the Sunday before Valentine's Day. If I were still in that calling today, it would be so great, having today be actually on Valentine's Day! I use to always give my primary kids the lecture about love, and how they all needed to be like Jesus and show love every day. I would tell them to be glad we have Valentine's Day to officially celebrate it.
Besides! What other holiday do we have that is set aside to celebrate a feeling? Not an event, not a cultural holiday...but a celebration of deep human emotion. Named after a man who showed love to so many, in an effort to obey that second great commandment from the One who loves us all: To love one another.
Happy Valentine's Day, friends! Happy Sabbath. Make it a great one.
Happy Valentine's Day to you as well, my dear! Can't tell you what a smile it brought to my face to have your blog pop up in my email (once I got past peering at it suspiciously, muttering "is this some kind of weird spam?", trying to figure out what kind of strange outfit had me on their mailing list of uplifting Valentine's thoughts, and generally spazzing out on recognising who or what Simon Says could be :) You're not the only one who kinda forgot about this neglected blog of yours...). Hope you really will start posting again: I almost never see anything on fb! I am so with you about Valentine's day: we've always made a big thing of it in my family as an occasion to make pretty cards for each other, exchange little presents, and eat lots of chocolate together — drinking peppermint hot cocoa in the evenings and gathering around the fondue pot to dip everything in sight in melted chocolate! — and generally making the grade-school celebration of love and arty-craftiness a family tradition to brighten the cold February days. I think there comes a moment in adolescence when it's hard to hang onto that wider sense of the holiday because, well, it's the springtime of your life and nature is whispering its messages of romance and paring-off pretty darn loudly in your ears (and fair enough — romantic love is kind of your job when you're a teenager!). It makes the pink-hearts-and-candy, loving your neighbour version of the holiday start to seem childish and irrelevant — certainly did for my daughter! But I think the important thing is that kids have it somewhere lodged in their imagination, a family tradition of love and celebration to draw on, like all the rest of their childhood, even when they think they've outgrown it. A reminder that (impossible as it is to believe when you are an angsty and/or lovesick teenager!) there's a lifetime of love — all kinds of love — beyond the romantic dramas of the moment.Well, unless you're Bella Swan, I guess :) But of course, WE know that that off-the-scale romantic love was really a fantasy about the human capacity for loving, tout court.... :)Miss you my dear, more than you can imagine. HUGS!
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