It’s Valentine’s Day, and that can only mean one thing: time to get super smug about having the best Valentine’s Days ever. Okay, sure, there have been a couple of duds, and at least one flaming disaster, but in general? I rule at this whole heart-shaped business.
Don’t believe me?
One year that will go down in history books: my college Roommate and I made a mountain of sushi, watched the entire Pride & Prejudice miniseries, got drunk off chocolate mousse (there may have been a good bit of rum in it), and genuinely confused a housemate about whether we were secretly lovers. Oh, and I think we took a few minutes to call our boyfriends to say hi.
The only Mr. Darcy worth a 6 hour miniseries.
Another year I made perfect chocolate souffle the first time I ever tried, and we basically just gorged on that all night long. This year the three of prepared with Katharine Hepburn’s brownies, and there’s even enough left in the pan from yesterday for us each to get a piece today!
To my everlasting sorrow, eating them did not magically give me these cheekbones.
A dear friend and I always make sure to send each other inappropriate love letters every year, on the theory that we need to leave confusing documentation for future historians, to keep them busy arguing about what, exactly, was going on there.
Several years ago I dragged my boyfriend-at-the-time (now Husband Extraordinaire) over half of Brooklyn, looking for heart-shaped cookie cutters so we could make heart-shaped pepperoni to put on our Valentine’s Day pizzas for each other. It turns out you shouldn’t wait till Valentine’s Day itself for that sort of thing, and everyone was sold out, but you can bet your ass that next year I was prepared well in advance, and had a whole set of hearts safely tucked in our kitchen drawer by Feb 1.
Even better than a pink teddy bear clutching a box of waxy chocolate!
Ever since then, we’ve never looked back. Heart pizzas and champagne for everybody! And by “everybody” I mean “us, on Valentine’s Day, while wearing pajamas”!
Look, I know Valentine’s Day is supposed to be this high-pressure romantic extravaganza of gifts and roses and expensive dinner reservations. I do! I appreciate that grown adults give each other stuffed animals and make plans months in advance, and I used to do some work for 1-800-FLOWERS, so I can assure you that I appreciate the enormous economic implications of a well-spent Valentine’s Day. (and I do mean well-spent)
It’s just that, well, nobody else seems to have nearly as much fun as we do. No gifts, no cards, but loud music, giggling over how totally ridiculous it is to use cookie cutters on pepperoni, and watching a bad movie cuddled on the couch. Maybe I’m just old and lazy, maybe we’ve been together for too long, maybe I just don’t understand what real romance is… but honestly?
It’s pretty perfect.
Glint of Light 