I'll Take the Poet-guy

It was different when I attended grade school in the late 60's. Mrs. Heinrichs (5th grade teacher) reminded us on February 10th to bring in a shoebox, which would be decorated with thin scarlet tissue along with as many pink contruction paper heart cutouts we could glue on. And don't forget to make a slit in that top so the Valentine's cards can be dropped in! The absolute rule was that everyone in the class had to bring a card for everyone else.

Because of this rule, my girlfriends and I always got cards from boys, an exciting and mysterious thing for 11 year old pre-pubescent females. After the cards had been slipped into the shoeboxes, it was time for the reveal. The girls would clump together in the corner with their respective shoe boxes, scrutinizing each and every envelope and its contents. Was there a hidden meaning behind the angel card from John Salisbury? Why did Mike Bensinger write his whole first and last on the back when he was the only person named Mike in the entire 5th grade? And the best surprise of all was when a girl got a card from a boy with no signature at all! All of these mysteries apparently must have meant something romantic! Or were we just little kids who were doing what the teacher asked?

What is it about February 14th? Some people intellectualize Valentine's Day by viewing it strictly as some historical battle in some long-forgotten Roman war, or they may dismiss it as a marketing ploy by Hallmark. Others romanticize the day by believing in Chaucer's love poems and in the cupids who decorate all the heart-shaped cards at the drug stores. Perhaps how we view this day depends on where we are in life, who is standing next to us (or who is not), if we feel some obligation or something else.

Obviously, we aren't in 5th grade anymore. And now that we are all grown up, we do not have decorated shoe boxes on our wooden desks, and there's no teacher to demand we give a Valentine card to every boy and girl in the class and receive one in return. We can decide to forget the silly holiday altogether, or we might choose to send Valentine greetings with total abandon to absolutely anyone we wish, whether they're lovers or friends or family.

And just because we might not receive a special romantic red envelope from some boy or girl on February 14th, isn't it just as wonderful knowing that you sent a love greeting that might make someone else feel great?

Well, almost as wonderful.