Unpopular Opinion :: My Husband And I Don’t Celebrate Valentine’s Day
In all honesty, I have never really celebrated Valentine’s Day. As a kid, my parents always got my brother and me a card and a small “happy” (which my husband and I now do for our kids), and I have done a Galentine’s Day here and there. But by and large, I don’t really partake in the holiday. To be fair, I think romantic gestures are wonderful. I just prefer spontaneous, and mundane romantic gestures. For example, one of my favorite romantic gestures of my husband’s is that he makes my coffee every morning, without fail, and has done so for 11 years. I have come to appreciate the ritual itself even more than the coffee. So, I’m not a love grinch; I just don’t really care for forced gestures of love. Again, that’s not to say that everyone who participates in Valentine’s Day is forced, but I’d venture that many people (especially men) feel an immense amount of pressure to keep up with the Jones’ on Valentine’s Day.
Admittedly, gift giving is not my love language, so that is likely another reason I don’t care to partake in Valentine’s Day. I feel similarly about push gifts, but that’s another post for another day. I’m a words of affirmation kinda gal. Which is the compromise my husband and I settled on our first few Valentine’s together. Initially, he didn’t believe that I didn’t celebrate or want a gift. I reassured him several times, but he was still doubtful. So imagine his surprise and my horror when he showed up with a gift and I didn’t. Truthfully, it was one of the most thoughtful gifts I have ever received, even though I truly did not expect or want anything. (It was the box set of the Golden Girls … something I had casually mentioned I had been on the hunt for). Nonetheless, it took that first year for him to finally believe me that I did not celebrate Valentine’s Day. We agreed on getting one another cards instead, but even that has fizzled out in recent years. And I honestly couldn’t care less.
We have our own love language, and our own simple ways to show each other how we feel. After 11 years married, 14 years together, and 25 years as friends, I am grateful for the casual romantic gestures … the ones woven into our daily routines. They have become rituals, like the coffee. Subtle, daily reminders that we still choose each other after all this time. They are beacons of light and unspoken apologies when we have a fight, gestures that bring smiles to our faces when we are apart, a secret love language between the dearest of friends, and something I look forward to daily. They keep us excited to be sharing a life together, and they have gotten us through a lot of life’s challenges. My parents’ relationship was, and still is, incredibly similar. Maybe that’s where I get it from.
So regardless of whether you celebrate or not, I hope everyone has a wonderful Wednesday … one full of love and happiness!
