This has been great, right? A little spin through time to understand where the holiday came from. Do you feel educated? Smarter? Does Valentine’s Day feel more significant for you now? I hope not. Mostly because I haven’t said enough yet but also, because, spoiler alert: I’m going to wrap this up with a sentiment that one day, we should do away with this shit for good.
I know what you might be thinking. Jaded human. Bitter. Lonely. Single. Nope. None of the above. I’m perfectly happy sharing with you that I am single. I’m also comfortable letting you know that I am scared to connect myself to another man at this point in my life. Of course, the state of the world is weighing on me and coloring my decisions. It’s not just that though, at all. I am really working on myself right now and I still don’t feel like I’m at a point where I would make a good decision in terms of who I might attach myself too. I feel as though there’s a possibility that I would revert to old behaviors and attract someone narcissistic, mean, controlling, and conniving. I feel as though I would restart a dynamic whereas I express myself in a wholly solicitous and deferential fashion. I know I’m better than I was, but I’m still not there, and so, I’m not terribly ready. Just half way there. Maybe.
That said, I firmly believe in love. Not just friend love or family love. I am a huge believer in romantic love. Mushy, gushy, sexy love. Whether I have it in my life or not, I know it exists. Not in the fantastical way we represent it, but in all the other ways. In the ‘there’s a seed in your tooth’ or ‘I got the tuna you like’ kind of ways. In the ‘I washed your car because I was out there’ and ‘I love you in that shirt’ ways. In the kiss when no one is watching and genuinely enjoy each other’s company kind of ways.
I am also not jealous of or unhappy for others who have found this kind of love. It doesn’t make me despondent and it doesn’t trigger feelings of self-pity. It makes me hopeful. It makes me lighter. It’s a light.
I’m also not about to drop some meme wisdom on you in the form of ‘we should love each other visibly every day’, because we don’t. We do NOT. Let’s dispel that notion RIGHT NOW. Even the people we love more than life piss us off. Sometimes it’s not even anything that they do. Sometimes we are just wretched and they happen to be in our line of sight and bam. Fuck you today sir/madam. Stay away from me. Pretend like this never happens to you. Fine. It does. It is what makes us human. We have feelings. We have good days and bad. Life throws us obstacles. Sometimes we have the ability to react and respond and do something about it and sometimes we don’t. We don’t stop loving people when we have these moments, we aren’t always in a position to be demonstrative with our affection. There are times that we want to be pissy or sad or just to be left alone.
What am I trying to say? Well, I think we should be humans. I think we should allow ourselves to be the most human versions of ourselves. I think that the idea of Valentine’s Day or even Galentine’s Day is contrived and only creates irresponsible and unnecessary pressure. It screams: be better. Do better. Be more loving. Be sexier. No bouquets of flowers? Less than. No cards with hearts galore? Inadequate. No candy basket in the background as you clink glasses with your best gal pal? Falling short.
NO. Fuck that shit. I’m done with it. I’ll be honest with you in that I fell short yesterday. I’ve been working so hard to separate myself from other people’s shit lately. I’ve been trying to get to a place where I can actively and compassionately listen without judgment or a burning desire to offer unsolicited advice. I failed yesterday. I didn’t feel critical. I just felt weary. I’m tired of listening to people feel diminished because they are without another half or in lieu of that person, another person to fill that slot temporarily. I am going to make a statement that might seem unfair, but it’s real. Really real. Ready? I just really think we need to somehow get to a place where we are individuals who stand on our own two feet but recognize the value and kindness in thinking as a society. As a whole.
Was that confusing or misleading? I’m sorry. I’m going to break that down.
I fear sharing with you that you should become an entirely independent human, because the truth is, I believe that we need each other. We need our loved ones, our people, but also, we need a fully interwoven community. We need to understand that our actions and behavior have a ripple effect beyond the tip of our nose or fingers or lips.
So, I would describe it as follows: recognizing that you are a whole, valid human on your own who should crave existing in the world with an awareness of other whole, valid humans.
Your wholeness or validity does not ebb and flow based on your connection to other humans. It might if you choose to ignore your place in a greater community or world, but it will not if you don’t have one or more other humans to rely on. To lean on. To count on.
It is truly magical to have people who love us and support us. I would even go so far as to say it is necessary. However, it is not a means to survival. I truly believe that has to come from deep within us. We have to uncover a certain existence in this big, bad world.
What is a holiday? A holiday is a celebration. A day of festivity. Is there something inherently wrong with making love into something that inspires a party? No. Not really. Except that we’ve lost the notion of what love means. When we celebrate Valentine’s Day, as we do in today’s world, we make it into something superficial.
I shared with a friend last night that I am loathe to bear witness to all those dedications on social media from people that are in what I know to be highly dysfunctional relationships, or from people who are desperately unhappy. On the surface, there is no real harm there. Sure, there are people who see those posts and feel bad about themselves because they don’t have it, but that’s something they have to contend with, not the people deciding to post. The real issue is that we are creating a very real group think when it comes to what love is and it’s very far from actual love. People don’t say what they are actually feeling and thinking because they are afraid of what the world will think of them. And this notion, this hyper focus on the world’s perception of us, is voiced all the damn time.
It was voiced to me by the friends who I spoke with yesterday. For once, I didn’t continue to engage with them, because if I’m honest, I felt too tired. I felt like I might be impatient or frustrated or sad or angry. And so, I extricated myself from the conversations. I just went within and it was a pretty damn fine decision.
One friend told me that she knew that her dark thoughts would push me away, so she wasn’t fully explaining what she was thinking and feeling. Another self-handicapped to beat the band before she delved in a little, only to pull back (you know, the whole ‘I’m sure I’m being ridiculous but…’). The funniest bit is that I didn’t judge these people for what they were thinking or feeling. I was pissed because once again, they were assuming that I wouldn’t get it. Even though I’ve explained thousands of times where I stand, I was being thrown into the pot of the whole world again.
The difference this time is that I accepted the label. Fuck it. Why was I trying to swim upstream during a storm? If I had voiced to one of these people that there is more to life than a relationship (maybe even share that some of the worst periods of my life were when I was in relationships), they would likely tell me I didn’t get it, don’t get it. I’d be branded as someone lacking in compassion. They would regret speaking to me. If I made the decision to stay quiet and just listen, they would judge me. Label me uncaring or aloof. It was a lose-lose, so I decided to step out. Remove myself. Take a back seat. I had nothing to prove. Not to them, and for once, not to myself.
Stay tuned.
L.
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