On this enforced day of love... our Valentine's Day cards!

My card to G.

G and I exchange silly cards several times a year: birthdays, anniversary, Valentine's Day, and we alternate each year in which of us produces our Christmas/Holiday card. They always consist of us Photoshopping our heads onto something appropriate - or appropriately inappropriate - and we usually try to find a place for Nicholas as well.

G's card to me. You may now refer to me as "spud"!

We, of course, scramble to share these on Facebook - we're so starved for attention! - but today I couldn't help thinking about how so many are distressed by this intrusive little holiday. A holiday that conspires to make single people feel like they've failed in some way. Being alone is not a failure! So I wrote this, there:

I know this weird, pushy, heavily marketed holiday can be unpleasant for a lot of people. Those who are unhappily uncoupled, particularly. It can make perfectly lovely people feel bad about themselves. Our society hammers away at the bullshit idea that it's bad to be alone. It's NOT.

My first real relationship happened when I was nineteen and ended about two years later. Then NOTHING until I was forty-six! Hardly even a date in twenty-five years. I was mostly very good with being alone, and at some point I figured that that was going to be how it went. I stopped HOPING. But at the same time, I guess I had some unconscious thought to keep myself "ready". I did a lot of work on myself, I kept my heart open but I didn't really expect anything at all. And I fell in love - unrequitedly - twice, once at the beginning of that twenty-five years, and once at the end. My heart was crushed, especially the second time, but somehow I stayed open. And when G stumbled into my life, I was ready for the next part of my life.

I'm not sure why I'm saying all this. I guess I remember the, what? disapproval? I felt from friends and family that I wasn't with someone for all those years. But I was fine! And as MUCH as I love G and our life together, sometimes I miss the absolute freedom of being a single person. Alone is cool! And I'd hate for all the lovey-face gushing of knuckleheads like G and me to make anyone feel bad about their singleness, to have that add to the stoopid societal message that this day wantonly spews. You are beautiful as you are, where you are. And if you still think that sucks, my advice - what, you should listen to me?! - would be to give up all hope - hope is a wall - and try to keep your beautiful, tender heart open. xoxo

Love is pretty sweet, though, too.