Heart Day

What I've Learned Thanks to Mr. Valentine

1. Valentine's Day when you're in elementary school is as tragic today as it was when I was that age.  My 9-year-old daughter literally gets sick by the constant attempts of making the boys and girls mingle at school.  Dancing with a boy when you're 9 is yucky.  Valentine's Day is dreaded by many little people for that reason alone.  Kids just want Valentine cards and candy.  Not lessons on etiquette.  When I was a child our school did a Valentine's Tea.  The boy had to literally escort you to the library and pull out your chair to seat you for the tea.  It was mortifying.  I still remember who my first dates were.  Justin Gereau and Tyler Hunter.

2. Flowers are overrated.  I'll take the Jimmy John's #12 for lunch over flowers any day especially when it's "freaky fast".  It was my kind of romantical when Mr. Handsome walked through the door yesterday afternoon with lunch in tow saving me from choking down another bite of yogurt.  My new motto...."food over flowers". 

3. It makes me smile to hear about young love, especially when my children giggle about Sally and Tom sneaking out to the "snow pile" and kissing "lip to lip".  Nothing more needs to be said.  Everyone at school knows exactly where "the snow pile" is.  No need for directions.  And "lip to lip"?  Wow!  Too cute.

(Of course I made up the names Sally and Tom.  We are after all in 2011 not 1975.)

4. I rocked the classroom back in the day with a Valentine's box made out of a shoe box and aluminum foil.  Yep.  It was shiny and spectacular.  Only problem that year was a little somebody named Bond.  James Bond.  No joke.  He was in my class.  He was smelly and dirty and kind of creepy.  Looking back he was probably a nice enough kid.  He just gave me the willies.  I thought he had a crush on me.  When we exchanged Valentine's that year I made certain that the card that I gave him had no hint of attraction or affection on it at all.   Funny thing is that each year at this time I remember Mr. Bond.  I either secretly had a crush on him or he scarred me for life.  I'll go with the latter of the two.

5. Conversation hearts may or may not come printed with the letters "DNA" on them.  Okay, so they don't.  I found this out the hard way.  I decided to make my husband a funny Valentine card out of conversation hearts.  I found this curious purple heart candy that said what I thought was DNA.  I thought it was odd that a candy would say DNA on it, but then again, conversation hearts get weirder and weirder by the year.  I mean, who says "Fax Me"?  So I put on my clever thinking cap and came up with a funny Valentine card full of conversation hearts and even managed to fit in the DNA heart.  Unfortunately when Mr. Handsome read the card he read all the candy hearts as they were intended to be read.  Apparently DNA was really DIVA.  I'm still cussing Necco for putting the I and the V too close together.

6. Lil G got a Valentine from a boy that said, "You are smashing!"  She is still on Cloud 9.  I'm confident that the boy who gave it to her had no idea what "smashing" meant.  But she took it literally.  Mars and Venus. 

7. Five dollars of decorations from Dollar Tree, a 2-liter bottle of sparkling soda, and fancy goblets make a heart-shaped pizza dinner magical. 

8. Valentines Day in junior high and high school is awkward and just a reminder what a loser you are.  Selling roses and sending them to people in class reaffirms that.  I mean, who wants to be sitting in class when the class presidency comes in to hand out flowers and a) you're the only one who doesn't get one or b) your friends and parents teamed up to send you one so you wouldn't be left out.  Awkward and more awkward.

9. What do you give a guy for Valentines Day?  Okay.  Besides that.  Back in '95 it was a Lucky t-shirt or some Preferred Stock cologne.  But after all these years there is still not a clear cut answer to this timeless question.  Most of the time I come to the conclusion that no gift is better than a lame gift.  Am I wrong?

10.  Fun Dip and Pixy Stix are of the devil.