Valentine's Day...Whatever.

Valentine's Day - we don't even bother.  Too crowded, we always say we'll "take a raincheck."  Mark always does give great gifts on the actual day, though.  We just rarely go out to eat anymore - and never as a couple - on the actual day.  If we go out, it's often all of us and we go someplace kid friendly with the girls and they think that's a nice treat.  Anyway, this year V-day was on a Friday, so we got a nugget tray from CFA and watched movies.  Fancy.  We decided to go out to eat "someplace nice" last night.  Girls were staying over night at grandparents, so great.  Mark had bought a water softener that was supposed to take "a couple hours" to install. This is where the wheels begin to fall off.  Four and a half hours later, Mark says, "Well, let's just go to Landry's."  This quickly became, "Dang, I have to get up early and it's after 9:00 already.  What about Whataburger?"  (I AM NOT EVEN KIDDING.)  On our way to Whataburger, Mark says, "Let's go to Chili's," which I thought was dead to him due to their inability to make his burger-to-go correctly.  THIS IS HOW WE ROLL, PEOPLE.  It's not pretty, it's not polished, it's not champagne and roses, one-a-week-no-matter-what- date-nights, flowers for no reason, we're in an argument so he comes home with a little box from Tiffany's.  We are not that couple. 


We are this couple: We're the couple who can divide and conquer when we have to, but we hate it and try to avoid it at all costs.  We're the couple who thinks vacation is for all of us, not Mark and me doing our thing and the girls doing theirs.  We're the couple who can speak an entire conversation in expressions alone while we're outside talking to our crazy neighbors.  We're the couple that hunts and fishes together.  We're the couple where the husband puts the gun in the wife's hands when a big buck comes out of the clearing...and he says, "Take him, take him!  I want YOU to take him!"  We're also the couple that knows when one or the other needs to lead; we don't always do this well, but we are learning.  We're the couple that texts during church, to each other, when we're sitting in church and can't say what we want outloud.  It's true.  We've been known to make each other laugh this way. 


So, while facebook was being blown up by champagne and roses, pictures of Do-Not-Disturb signs (ummmm...okay), couples dressed to the nines at the doors of 5-star restaurants, pictures of gifts galore ranging from purses to jewelry....


and some posts that were not so celebratory - some friends in the midst of divorce, struggling to find contentment and joy as they grieve the end of something that wasn't supposed to end; along with posts I would akin to the facebook post version of Gloria Gaynor's I Will Survive....


and everything in between. 


Where does our Valentine's Day land?   Our nugget tray, candy and gifts, movie night Valentine's Day was fine.  The do-over, par.  Our life is an adventure in tackling the ordinary.  It is not first-class tickets to California wine country.  I knew this when on our first married Valentine's Day we ended up at Taco Cabana for dinner because we couldn't get into any restaurants.  I have come a long way from that Pouty Miss-Priss I was on Valentine's Day 1997, I think.  What I know is every day is just that: one day.  It doesn't not have to be the BEST day because it has a title.  If I am truly committed to this marriage, then my perspective is going to be that some days will be amazing, and some days will be less amazing.  But at the end of it, if my feet are cold, they're going to Mark's side of the bed where they can be warmed up on his legs.  Forever.


Happy Valentine's Day!  May whatever it is to you, be yours forever.