Ahhhh…
February 14.
A time when every store display is cinnamon heart red and a Pepto Bismol pink.
Jittery line-ups at flower shops and jewellery stores.
A time when school children get their parents to buy kits of cards or crates of craft paper, enough for ALL the kids in the class. When I was little, we’d spend an art class making “mailboxes” for our Valentines. Each child would bring to school an empty cereal or tissue box to decorate with paper, stickers, glitter, and bows. I once made mine with little “barn” doors. At the end of the day, we’d all traipse up and down the aisles of desks, playing mailman with our bundle of cards and dropping them in the appropriate boxes.
The number of Valentines you received was VERY important. It didn’t matter who they were from, just as long as you had more than the snotty pretty girl who sat at the front of the class in her new red velvet dress and black patent leather shoes.
Looking back, I can’t ever remember LOVING Valentine’s Day. Sure, I’ve received roses and cards and chocolate and jewellery. Once, a beau of mine even presented me with seat covers for my truck (yeah… no points, not even for originality, for that one.) All these gifts seemed ‘romantic’ at the time, but looking back, they were just candy floss, sugary sweet, and dissolved just as quickly.
Which brings me to the legend of St. Valentine. There are a couple of stories about the guy. My favourite is the one where he married Christian couples in secret in defiance of Emperor Claudius II. Valentine was a shit-disturber! He was a fellow who decided to go against the edict of the emperor (a tyrant, from what I’ve read). He recognized an injustice that stood in the way of goodness and decided to do something about it.
Heroic, not self-serving.
St. Valentine, the patron Saint of love. But, ironically, he is also the patron saint of the plague. Dictionary.com’s definitions of plague are:

1. An epidemic disease that causes high mortality; pestilence.
2. An infectious, epidemic disease caused by a bacterium, Yersinia pestis, characterized by fever, chills, and prostration.
3. Any widespread affliction, calamity
4. Any cause of trouble, annoyance, or vexation.
   Now thiiiiiink about this. Think honestly. Think carefully about your history with romantic love. Kinda fits some portions of these definitions, doesn’t it? Especially in high school. Or University. Or well into adulthood for some of us. Funnily enough, I was browsing through some ancient artefacts stored in my trunk. Journals from college and university are filled with all sorts of insecure angst about a boyfriend, and I was reminded that many a time I flung myself prostrate on my bed wishing and wanting and wondering about a certain boy. AND many a time calamity, trouble, annoyance and most certainly vexation followed.
   Since then, however, I haven’t been much of a romantic. I don’t think I’ve become hardened or stoic; I just think I’ve become a bit more introspective and sensible. (Well, I should hope so at my age!)
   Now, I think the most romantic notion is…
   consistency over time.
   Not words.
   Not purchases.
   Not public proclamations on social networking sites.
   But actions and decisiveness and dependability…
   …oh, and undying devotion and adoration doesn’t hurt either! : )

I remember the colour of my grandmother’s kitchen table.

It was an institutional green with little gold stars

and a splattering of tiny pin prick polka dots.

The matching plastic chairs were cushiony and comfortable…

unless you sat on them for a long period of time wearing shorts. Then getting up from the table was difficult

and somewhat painful.

I would visit that table every Friday evening after school was finished and piano lessons were completed.

Because we were “good” Catholics, most Friday’s we’d eat salmon casserole

accompanied by canned string beans, and mashed potatoes.

Some Friday’s were special and Grandma would serve fish sticks and Rice-A-Roni

both tasting scrumptious on my little girl palate.

We’d gather around that table on Sundays as well.   On that day Grandma would serve her after church special

of fried chicken and rice.

Our feast would end with chocolate chip cookies or butterscotch pie.

Friday after Friday

and

Sunday upon Sunday

I’d sit at that table and eat and visit and “be” with my family.

Until Grandma got too old and frail to cook.

Then we’d go for burgers

or hotdogs

or the Motor Inn Breakfast Buffet.

But it wasn’t the same

as sitting around

that green kitchen table.

“Because even the smallest of words can be the ones to hurt you, or save you.” ― Natsuki Takaya

Months ago I dropped a little glass desert bowl on my tiled kitchen floor

and tiny glass shards shattered at an impressive radius around the drop site.

I swept and vacuumed.

Then swept some more.

Then vacuumed.

Then mopped and then vacuumed some more.

Still I found shards

clinging to the bottom of my sock,

and sometimes, to my chagrin, embedded in the heel of my foot.

No matter how hard I looked for the miniscule bits -the remnants of my clumsiness ,

I could never find them.

But,

I would come across them at the most inopportune moment –

when I was hopping out the door, one foot shod, the other bare,

or when I was shuffling to get a glass of water before going off to bed.

And I’d have to find pair of tweezers and perform minor surgery and then find the broom and give the floor another going over.

When we throw out insult or hurt someone we love,

it’s like breaking a little glass bowl.

Instead of a slip of the hand it is a slip of the tongue.

A clumsy handling of emotion.

And no matter how hard we try to pick up the pieces and make amends,

there will always be little sharp glass grains of sand

that will hide in wait.

Reminding us that what we say, or don’t say, can haunt us for months.