valentine

Flowers for my heart with tender words
And a gentle touch that says so much
This is how I’ve heard that love should always be.*

Valentine’s Day.

Again, the commercialized and cloyingly cute messages are filling the in-boxes, mail boxes, and trash boxes across the country. More flowers, candy, and cheaply-made cards will be purchased than at any other time of year.

All to express a love that never was and never will be.

Love, that is. It will never be love.

Love isn’t flowers, isn’t a close embrace, isn’t sweet nothings whispered into an ear as you dance in the dark. And, it certainly isn’t the thousand dollar diamond necklace slipped around the throat of the picture-perfect beauty queen primping in the mirror before slinking out to a romantic dinner for two.

Our culture lies.

It lies every time an ad suggests all you need to keep your mate’s love is some pretty new bauble. It lies with each new revelation of ways to keep love fresh in some exotic destination or with an amazing new scent.

I want some new images to exemplify love.

How about a toilet seat? Either up or down will do. Love is him, putting it down for her. It’s her, ignoring the fact that it never gets put down.

Perhaps it could be black olives. He loves them, so she includes them in her recipes. She hates them, so he removes them from the frozen pizza before it goes in the oven.

The list could go on, including not a single item that Hallmark could market. The old toothbrush he used to clean up that ugly old vase that she bought at the second-hand store. The spool of thread she emptied to mend his favorite old work coveralls. The ice scraper he uses on frosty mornings, so she doesn’t have to stand out in the cold and do it herself.

In recent years, I have found some new items that illustrate love. You don’t want to hear about them. They are uncouth and will make you say the word gross as you see them in print.

And that’s a shame. Because, you see, the other lie that our culture tells is that your mate will always be attractive and will always be healthy.

He won’t. She won’t.

The bedpan and the urinal spring to mind. Bodily functions become the concern of the one who loves. Embarrassment and squeamishness are abandoned as love does, not what it wishes, but what it must.

Not so uncouth, but still not an attractive thought, the fork and spoon push their way into the symbolism, as one mate must feed another. The memory of feeding the cake to each other at the wedding comes back with a rush, and we realize that it is a promise we will keep.

I believe the one item I would chose to symbolize love most is nothing more than a simple handkerchief.

These cloth relics of the past have fallen out of fashion—replaced by the paper tissues we use and crumple into the trash by the thousands, but I like to have one in my back pocket. I would be lost without it.

With the handkerchief we dry the tears of children, and yes, wipe their noses too. I mop my forehead when the perspiration beads and threatens to run down my face. But, all through my life the one thing I have used that square bit of cloth for, more than any other use, has been to wipe away the tears that have come.

When puppy dogs died suddenly, the tears from the children’s eyes were soaked up; those from my own, as well. When the frustrations of financial want were too much, the handkerchief once again dabbed away the tears of fear for the future.

I have seen the tears of spouses as they turned away from the hospital bed their lover lay upon, perhaps for the last time. Other tears have been wiped away as elderly parents departed from this world to a better place; they were wiped away as conversations led to the realization that mental faculties were failing.

Tears fall. Sometimes, they are tears of happiness. More often as life progresses, they are tears of worry and of sorrow, but always, they are tears of love.

Tears fall. And we wipe them away. For each other.

And, there’s nothing cheap about that.

You can keep your cheap paper valentines. You can keep your sugary-sweet chocolates (well, maybe just one). You can even keep your diamonds and jewels. They’re cheap too, in a way.

Tears fall. And we stay.

Because—love.

Life is like an onion; you peel it off one layer at a time, and sometimes you weep.
(Carl Sandburg ~ American writer/poet ~ 1878-1967)

He will wipe every tear from their eyes.
(Revelation 21:4 ~ NIV)

* from How Love Should Be by Jeremy Michael Lubbock ~ American singer/songwriter

I’m sure that today, of all days, I should wax eloquent regarding this date set aside for lovers, but I’m drawing a blank. I went back and read my post from Valentine’s Day a couple of years ago to see if I could glean any ideas for yet another treatise on our annual trek through the sentimental terrain of the day.

Nothing.

I had no idea of what to talk about the year before that, either. You see, for all my introspection, all my analytic brooding, I am still no good at the mushy stuff.

I am, after all, a mere man; not given to romantic gestures, save occasionally. I am also a cynic, believing this date is nothing more than a once relatively obscure holy day, dedicated to an equally obscure saint named Valentine.

Truth be told, there were two men by that name designated as saints by the early Catholic Church, neither of which originally had any connection whatsoever to romantic lore or history. It is only in the last century that stories have been fabricated to turn the day into one with connotations of romantic love.

The cynic in me believes the hype to be a conspiracy by the commercial concerns which stand to gain financially from the widespread celebration of the fake holiday.

And, do we spend money on the day!

I’m thinking of one Valentine’s Day, many years ago, when a young man, nervous and anxious to impress his young fiancee (she was only seventeen that year), went out and spent every dime he could scrape up to buy a piece of jewelry for her. Even though it meant there would be no romantic dinner (not even a Number 3 Burger with Tots at the local Sonic), he spent the extra couple of dollars it took to have her initial engraved on the gold-plated stickpin.

It wasn’t even real gold! Regardless, the gift was eminently successful. The young lady was duly impressed, or at least appeared to be, and the fact that there was no romantic candlelit dinner went by without comment.

After that, the stickpin could be seen frequently, pinned through the lapel of her jacket or on a scarf worn around her neck, to the lasting enjoyment of both the beautiful young lady and the bumbling young man.

I stole the stickpin out of the young lady’s jewelry box tonight so I could photograph it for you. She was not happy. It’s not a thing of beauty anymore. The shaft is slightly bent (from a too-thick jacket lapel), the edges are showing wear (gold-plated, not solid, you remember), and the clutch is not even the original one.

She doesn’t wear it much, since such trinkets have fallen out of fashion. But, the Lovely Lady is not through with it yet. The cheap little piece of costume jewelry has value to her still. Though no sane person would ever offer anything for it, she would not part with it for money.

I promised to return it before I go to bed, later. It’s a promise she will hold me to.

This not-so-young man is gratified to realize that the years have not tarnished the feelings a bit. There have been many months of February which have passed since that one so many years ago. Most of them have passed with little notice.

And, what of flowers, chocolates, or romantic meals at favorite restaurants? Those do come frequently, but mostly on other days of the year. The cynical resistance to the commercialism of the day is shared by both of us.

Yet, not a day goes by that each doesn’t verbally remind the other of our love for them. We show it in untold ways, too. As always, I get the better end of the deal. She doesn’t complain and even insists that she is content with her part of the bargain. I believe her, although I still can’t understand it.

You know, if you’ve read many of these posts, that I am unashamedly in love with that same young lady who received the cheap little stickpin all those many years ago.

It’s the way marriage is intended to be.

The world around us tells us differently. Even the celebration of romantic love on just one special day a year is at odds with the reality of what true love is.

Although we know deep down that love is a way of life, and not an emotion, we continue to live for ourselves, selfishly insisting on our own way and indulging in our own pleasure.

By our selfishness, we deny that love is exactly what God says it is. What we believe love to be is so far from the truth of genuine love that it resembles the original not at all.

Whew! For not having anything to say on the subject, I’ve dived in headfirst, haven’t I?

Okay. Discourse done, I’ll step down from the soapbox once more.

Besides, I’ve got to get that stickpin back in the jewelry box before morning…

Let love increase!

Love is patient, love is kind, it is not envious. Love does not brag, it is not puffed up. It is not rude, it is not self-serving, it is not easily angered or resentful. It is not glad about injustice, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.
(I Corinthians 13: 4-8 ~ NET)
Let the wife make the husband glad to come home and let him make her sorry to see him leave.
(Martin Luther~German theologian and church reformer~1483-1586)

He's Taken Leave

Random wanderings with Paul Phillips

Because—Love

A Fake Holiday Observed—Once Again