What's Love Got to do With It?...

OK!  So I was given a reason to not hate this day.  My friend Teresa dropped off a single yellow rose and a box of chocolates to let me know that someone was thinking of me.  She didn't want me to have nothing.  And my friend Kelli mailed me a card.  And my friend Heidi called me.  And my cousit Rhetta changed her FB profile picture to us in honor of me.  This 14^th day of February.  This day that has come to be known as the “day for lovers.”  I didn't make it be that way.  Society did.  If you want the truth it really all started, according to Wikipedia, this way:

St. Valentine's Day began as a liturgical celebration of one or more early Christian saints named Valentinus. The most popular martyrology associated with Saint Valentine was that he was imprisoned for performing weddings for soldiers who were forbidden to marry and for ministering to Christians, who were persecuted under the Roman Empire; during his imprisonment, he is said to have healed the daughter of his jailer Asterius. Legend states that before his execution he wrote "from your Valentine" as a farewell to her.

Interestingly I cannot find out why those soldiers were forbidden to marry, but I have a pretty good guess.   Or maybe I am way off.  Who knows?

I do want to explain myself though.  I do not hate Valentine’s Day because I am single and do not have a lover.  I thoroughly agree that if you love something, anything, that much, that every day that love should be celebrated.  For instance, dinner and champagne is good any damn day of the week.  It’s even better when it is a surprise.  And I don’t even hate the day because it is the biggest day of the year to send and receive flowers.  I like sending flowers for no reason at all.  To me those are the best days to send and receive them.  When you least expect them.  I do not hate the day because it’s all about chocolate and I am not a big sweets person to begin with.  I do not really even hate the day because I have never had a Valentine.  I have had Valentine’s.  In second grade…probably in 6^th, High School, etc. Yes I have even had a Valentine as an adult once or twice for a brief fleeting moment.  To be honest though, as an adult I don’t remember every celebrating it with anyone…meaning one of us was always working or whatever. 

SOOOOOOOOOOOO, why do I not like this day?  And let’s say I don’t like it instead of hate it, cause hate is a very strong word.  I seriously dislike it.  But anyway…

We can all agree, probably, that the day is the big once a year reminder of love right?  We can all agree it doesn't have to be about the love between couples, or spouses or significant others right?  OK, fine, it does not have to be about that, but that is what it is truly driven by.  Whether you celebrate it that way or not. Today, in 2013, it is promoted as a day of lovers.  To celebrate love.  Blah blah blah.  With that being said, drum roll please, the reason I seriously dislike February 14, Valentine’s Day is because…

Contrary to popular belief, or the belief of my sister, I do not believe in love.

 HOLD YOUR HATS ON.  She claims that I am single because I am looking for “the fairy tale  the white picket fence hoopla, and the perfect relationship.” And that does not exist.  And therefore, since it does not exist, I will be alone forever because I refuse to settle for less.   I KNOW WELL ENOUGH TO KNOW there are no perfect relationships.  There are however two imperfect people who can work on loving one another perfectly.  That is all that is necessary.  The relationships that work get this.  The ones that do not obviously do not know this or agree it cannot be done with one another.  And there is no shame in admitting you cannot love someone.  The shame?  Is convincing someone you do and you can love them and the imperfections but then not mean a word of that.   If you cannot love me or you cannot love me the way I want to be loved, do not waste my time and yours trying to convince me otherwise and then leave, or cheat, or change your mind.  HENCE THE REASON I do not believe in love.  No one has proven to me that it exists.  Some have tried.  All have failed.  I have no idea if any of them meant a single solitary word they ever said to me, because they are obviously not here to ask, but they couldn't follow through and that to me is priceless.

People fall in and out of love daily.  People change.  Avoiding telling someone that your love has changed for them in any capacity, or that it never existed in the first place, is a pretty shitty ass thing to do.  Or one of my favorite all time statements ever?  I didn't mean to fall for this OTHER person, it just happened.  Nothing JUST HAPPENS that way.  If you cared a smidgen about me the way you claimed to, you would have never saw the second person to begin with.  Which as they say is why if you have “fallen” for two different people, you should chose the second, because it means you never truly fell for the first one in the first place.

So…long story short.  I do not believe in love.  Not that kind.  Yes I love Brodie.  I love my friends, I love my family.  I love my bed.  I love Keystone Light and taking cruises.  I do not believe in romantic love, which is what all the bullshit hype is about on this day. 

I am sorry.  But I do not.  Fairy tale?  I cannot be holding out for a fairy tale when I do not believe that even exists can I?  Maybe someday, Cupid will strike my ass with his arrow, when I least expect it, because I sure and the hell am not looking for it.  But I can assure you when and if it does happen that person has their work cut out for them.  Because it is going to take a miracle to make me believe. 

I will just let Tina take it from here...