So for all those who know me a little bit, I dislike banalities with a vengeance.

Maybe I should say then that I DETEST banalities…

Not that I don’t fall into the trap of saying or doing them. For what it is worth though, I try my hardest not to.

So let’s discuss Valentine’s Day.

Why?

Because I bloody hate the day. Because it possibly is the biggest banality out there, with vomit on top and wrapped in tinsel and then with a huge snot bow (the green type).

I cottoned on to this when I was at the tender age of Fourteen… By the time I was Sixteen, when a sweet, young suitor offered me red roses and a heart shaped pin in a crowded coffee shop I flipped out and broke up with him. Poor boy.

It shouldn’t have come as a surprise that my mom found him drunk at our apartment building doorstep the next week.. oh no..  Nor should it have been a surprise that he hated my guts thereafter.. Although with my social ineptness I couldn’t, for the life of me, figure out why “… ‘cause I was honest and straight with him, you know? Isn’t that all that matters?”.. as I reasoned.

(Later on people will be relieved to know that I did figure it out, and that I did understand that honesty is not necessarily what matters the most. Breaking someones heart was/is. People will be relieved to know that now I mostly shut up, instead of blurting things out or, for that matter, tell lies).

Back to the boy… How was he to know that Valentine’s day made my skin crawl? Right? How was he to know that the sight of bars and restaurants donned in paper hearts and bows, and red kisses and cupids made my stomach turn to the point of physically having to throw up?

Now.. the psychological reasons for that, I do not know. I haven’t dwelled on it either because I do not feel there is anything wrong to my aversion to this Faux Love Fest.. like I don’t feel my aversion to multicoloured bed sheets, needlepoint frames (or cushions actually), vinyl trousers, aromatic toilet paper (what made you buy that anyway??), novelty picture frames, spam mail, eczema, dog shit on the soles of my shoes (POOPSCOOP ASSHOLE! Yes, YOU!), Jessica Simpson, public toilets, stepping on water while wearing socks, germs need to be justified or looked into.

They Just Are Things Perfectly Reasonably to Want To Ban From Life Forever.

So fast forward many years… fast forward me never accepting dates on Valentine’s, or refusing to go out on said day with people I dated.. skip the misguided efforts to ban the “celebration” by ranting off the top of my voice in the middle of a couple’s love fest at a bar or another and just ignore the years that I was a single female, living on my own cursing, cussing and spitting on the ground at people who wished me Merry Valentine’s on the day..

… to the week that I was to meet my Beloved, Super Great, Awesome, Amazing, Smart, Handsome (is he blushing yet?), Cynical, Sweet and after all Husband.

Queue Harp and violins and trumpets and some Motorhead.

We had met a year before and were casually flirting for a couple of months.. You know what? It doesn’t really matter. All that you need to know is that we were to meet up mid February. Sadly, that is very close to the cursed Valentine Day.

It was life pissing on my parade.. It was The Gawds crapping on the porch of my beliefs.

Queue Horror music, Shrilling screams, images of Fleeting Shadows and Creaking Coffins..

…

As it was we just managed to skip the Cursed Date of Valentine’s by sheer luck and flight schedules.

…

Swiss Airlines didn’t have a flight on the day…

…

The hotel didn’t have a room…

…

Well, and actually the gathering I was attending (don’t ask.. it is extremely Geeky and Nerdy) didn’t start until the 15th of February.

…

Queue Neil Diamond elevator music here… Look nonchalantly and casually at the elevetor panel…

…

If we had an anniversary on the 14th of February, I am not sure I would have been able to live with it. I would have to make up a date and lie about it.

As it stands this year I think we may celebrate by watching The Seven Year Itch as it is our seven years mark, drink some Lemonade, and have some sushi on our lounge floor in the lovely San Francisco, while cuddling our lovely boy Oliver and burning any Valentine paraphernalia we can find in our makeshift fire made of Broken Hearts and Bleeding Lovers..

Life is good when you share it with someone who views life through the same binoculars. Even if they are viewing it the other way around and you refuse to take out one of the lense covers.

Indeed.

Current Read:

Lost Girls, by Alan Moore and Melinda Gebbie

Current Music:

Let it Go, by William Young