The Valentine's Day That Wasn't
don't you want somebody to love
Nobody said it was easy
Oh, it's such a shame for us to part
Nobody said it was easy
No one ever said it would be so hard
Coldplay - The Scientist
I spent a portion of Valentine’s Day at the vet, where my dog was getting checked out for some stomach issues. Those two hours I was there were anxious hours while I waited to see if Ren’s issues were small or big (they were small), but they were a respite from the way I spent the other hours of the day - thinking about the holiday, thinking about being alone and single, about feeling like a piece of driftwood set out on the ocean.
Valentine’s Day 2021 wasn’t horrible. I was newly free, two weeks removed from being unceremoniously dumped after 15 years together, but I had this small hope then that it was all just a lot of bluster and he’d be back and we’d work it out. There is no hope this year. We’re divorced now, the fate of our relationship sealed with a flourished judge’s signature. We’ve gone our separate ways; we talk only when it has it do with the dog or an errant piece of mail. But I still cling to the past, still long for the days of happiness, still yearn for a time when I wasn’t so damn lonely. And thus, my Valentine’s Day 2022 was a mess of tears and longing and feeling sorry for myself.
I thought about Valentine’s Days of the past, the ones in grammar school where we made cardboard mailboxes to put on our desk so our fellow classmates could fill them with cards, and the humiliation and abject sadness of not getting a single card. I thought about my previous marriage, that one February 14th where I made him dinner and wrote a lengthy inscription in a romantic card and bought him tickets to a concert and he responded by ignoring me while he played video games. It’s historically not a good holiday for me, but for the 15 years Todd and I were together, it was. I got flowers. We went out to dinner. We exchanged cards with heartfelt word. We were kind and gracious to each other, like we were most all of the time. All those past, terrible Valentine’s Days were negated when I was with him, pushed back into the recess of my brain where I keep memories I should throw away, except that my brain likes to hurt me.
So this particular Valentine’s Day was hard. There was no hope, nothing to cling to. No card, no flowers, no candy, no dinner. Just a trip to the vet and, later, several hours of brooding, of staring out the window and getting lost in a recurring daydream, this fantasy where it all never happened, where we are still us.
I’m on Facebook and post after post is someone gushing about their partner on this Valentine’s Day. They look so happy, so content. I wonder if they really are, if the photos aren’t just a facade. I want to be thrilled for them, I want them to always feel loved, but I’m lonely and sad and I close the tab and go back to watching Julian Baker performances on YouTube. There she is singing “Sour Breath” and she gets to you’re everything you want and I’m all you dread and I have to close that tab, too, and then close the laptop before I start looking at photos of us happy, content.
I’m single, but not just single. I’m recently single. That means everything is still new and fresh; there’s not been enough time for healing, there’s barely been enough time to grieve. My divorce was finalized in December. I still have my attorney’s voicemail where she yelled a cheery “congratulations!” into the phone before dropping the news that my marriage was officially dead. I’m still reeling, in a way.
Listen, I don’t want to like Valentine’s Day. I spent years telling people it didn’t matter to me because we loved each other with passion and romance every day, so who needs a special day put aside to love and be loved. Turns out I do. I secretly liked it. I liked the attentiveness which I admittedly didn’t always get in our busy lives. I liked feeling special, the declarations of love that he normally kept close. I liked the flowers, the candy, the way we went out to eat at 4:00 so we didn’t have to deal with the holiday crowds that evening. I enjoyed the pomp and circumstance of it all. Most of all I just loved having someone to love. Having no one to shower with love and affection stung this year.
I had to text him with regards to Ren, as our dog is the only thing that is still ours. We exchanged about a half hour’s worth of texts and it was all I could do to not blurt out “Happy Valentine’s Day, I still love you,” but instead I complained our pet insurance deductible and relayed the vet’s diagnosis. I looked at my phone, at the picture of him above his name, at his special place in my pinned contacts, and I berated myself for hanging on the way I do, for letting the day get to me, for being, well, me.
Last night I bought myself a Valentine’s Day present (Collective Soul’s first album on vinyl), got a little high, listened to my cynical “love is dead” playlist and ate half a bag of dried apple rings. Not exactly a romantic experience, but one that satisfied me in a way. I treated myself. I was good to myself. Maybe there was no handwritten card, no steakhouse dinner, no bouquet of flowers on the kitchen counter, but there was a sliver of contentment, the inkling of a knowledge that I can make myself happy.
I honestly thought Valentine’s Day would be easy, but as I learned, nothing really comes easy these days. It was hard, I’ll admit that. I let the Hallmark, corporate holiday get to me. I let the trappings of the day get me down. Did I learn anything from it? No. Did I make a vow at the end of the night to never let all of this make me think I’m not worthy of being loved again? No. But I’ll get there eventually. For now, It’s hard. For now, I’m stuck on how hard this has been.
I went back on Facebook and put a thumbs up under each picture of my smiling friends with their partners. I’m happy for you, I really am. Someday I’ll be happy for me. This Valentine’s Day wasn’t it. All I can do is shrug and move on.