Fuck Valentine’s Day

Who needs it? In the days leading up to this puffy pink holiday of jaded love, I was bombarded with ads reminding me that I wasn’t complete unless I was celebrating this holiday with someone special. So I am. As I sit alone, at the bar of my favorite drafthouse movie theater, drinking a beer and waiting to see a movie, I am spending time with me.  

Valentine’s Day is so lame, that even our plans to get together and have a party to not celebrate it, fell through. Sadly my coworker friends failed to coalesce with an actual plan.

Several days ago, the all too painful reminder that love is fleeting appeared as one friend was in the midst of another tiff with her girlfriend. We tried to take her mind off it with videogames and IHOP.  She felt somewhat better, fortified to move ahead without her, should her threats to leave become fact.

Another friend recently discovered the peace that can only be found after disentangling yourself from complicated relationships. Unfortunately, the spider attempted to catch him in his tangled web again when my friend received a text out of the blue. It was a poor attempt to get him on the hook for a Friday night booty call. Stay strong friend.   

I take this day to reflect on the unlikeliness that I will ever get involved in another relationship. I don’t feel equipped to recognize what a healthy relationship looks like. Looking back at the trail of tears of the men in my relationship past, I clearly have no taste.

I am not counting the burned bridges of hookups who I never saw again, the one night stands that I shucked like so much corn as soon as I could put my clothes back to rights. Even when they asked to see me again,  there was only 1 repeat, and that was accidental design when I forgot my favorite necklace in his dorm room. So, there’s that.

Sorry guy-whose-name-I-don’t-remember. You were adequate.   

I love romance. Don’t get me wrong. It’s just that I am realistic enough to know that I wouldn’t recognize what real romance looks like in my life, and thus have no expectations of having it outside of my imagination.   

The loaded expectations of this fucking holiday are enough to drive a fragile heart to the edge. The commercial machine is a mindfuck looking for a buck. So love yourself and take yourself out for a nice dinner. Buy yourself flowers. Spend time doing what YOU like. Do not compromise because you think the only way you can win is to have somebody else tell you that you are worthy.

You are worthy.   

Of that there is no doubt.