I really can’t stand Valentine’s Day.
It’s just a day where florists cheat you of your money by jacking up the prices of roses that will eventually wilt and turn into composite for their fellow roses, where restaurants put together “special menu” which involve essentially the same dishes but with fancy names like “lovers’ delight” and “two hearts entwined” or something as cheesy as that, where everyone conspires to make you feel miserable if you are single.
What a load of BS.
If you truly love me, you wouldn’t need a reason to buy me flowers, you wouldn’t wait till that day to buy me a meal, you wouldn’t plan for a special night out only then. If you love me, small gestures, such as texting me “good morning” everyday, holding my hand as often as you can, sharing with me your problems and dreams, hugging me whenever I need someone to hold me, would be enough.
Which explains why, when I saw a familiar face staring back at me from the cover of last Thursday’s ST supplement, a so-called Valentine’s Day special, my first reaction was one of cynicism. Like VK, it felt as if these young men were selling themselves to their employers, despite whatever reservations they might have had.
But as I read my former classmate’s words, depicting how he truly happy he had felt being with the girl that he had liked for so long that even taking the train to run errands together was special, my wall of cynicism slowly went down. It felt especially poignant because I know the sweet lady involved, and I had known about his despair when the short-lived romance ended.
And I think this is what life and love is about. Cherishing the little things and never regretting. Hell, I have made my fair share of mistakes, I have hurt someone’s feelings badly and felt extremely guilty. But I don’t regret what I have done, because I know that in the end, it would all work out to be for the better. That eventually, we would come to understand why we made the choices that we did, that if we learn from every experience, we would come away a better person. And sometimes, these little collisions with someone else’s lives give you a wealth of memories and good feelings and these last till the day you die, to put it melodramatically.
Fate is a special thing. Out of the many people that you meet everyday, you somehow managed to share a path with that one person. Maybe your paths continue for a long time, maybe they turned into different directions after a while. But whatever it is, it takes something for two people to find each other and that something can never be replicated with someone else.
So don’t feel lousy just because you don’t have a date for Valentine’s Day, don’t get mad at your loved one because he didn’t send you roses (or is involved in a 40-men raid).
Maybe the best thing that ever happened to us is that we have loved and lost before.
Yannisms 