The Daily Post Challenge for Valentine’s Day was a good one – Write an ode to someone or something that you love. I love a good ode. I know I’m a few days late on this one, but I’ve been having such a fantastic weekend, it’s just now I can sit to write my ode. Ode ode ode.

This *was* me
This *was* me

I was somewhat excited about this Valentine’s Day. I’ve spent the past several years “celebrating” in a someone macabre way – usually wearing all black, shouting for “Singles Awareness,” practicing voodoo on all my exes with other chronically single girlfriends, and documenting it to the high heavens on this blog. (See here)

But this is the first in a long time that I was actually going to “share” with a someone special. My boyfriend is pretty romantic, and I’m easy to please, so I had good feelings about it. Not high expectations, because he’s also a guy who hates commercialization and hype and forced feelings, but I was excited. However when we talked about what we might do, we discovered that I was working all day and then coaching volleyball until 8:30pm, and he was going to work all day and then had been invited to dinner, so we weren’t going to see each other until Friday. I was disappointed, but thought he might send me flowers at work and that would be special, and Friday we were going on a hike to the beach.

But then, 6:15am on Thursday, as my alarm went off to go on my morning workout, I rose to turn it to snooze for another 45 minutes (and not work out), when my door slowly opened and a familiar figure walked in.

“What are you doing here?!”

“Happy Valentine’s Day!”

“Oh my gosh. Where are my glasses.”

Keep in mind that when I wake up in the morning, I am a laughable sight – mouthguard, hair in seven different directions, fumbling for my glasses, eyes squinting open like a mole coming out of the ground, etc. And on this particular morning, I had slept dressed in head to toe workout clothes, including socks and headband, all the more to motivate me to get out of bed and work out.

ImageSo when someone wants to surprise you and actually see you like that in the morning, when he gets up at 5am and drives to Safeway, waits in the frigid cold for it to open so he can buy you flowers, breakfast, your favorite candy (conversation hearts!), a puzzle with animals on it, and had coordinated with your roommates to come into your house before the sun’s even up, and endures your morning breath, and goes on your morning workout with you…..you’re pretty sure you have a winner.

He was a little concerned that I didn’t react more violently to someone unexpectedly walking into my room in the wee hours of the morning…wondering where my baseball bat and scream and rape whistle were….but I guess I just knew it was him. :)

I’ve spent a lot of years bitter and lonely and wanting and waiting. It’s nice to finally feel so happy, and so loved, and special enough for someone to do something special for me. And I know this will embarrass him, but he will tolerate it because writing is something I have to do. And after so many years whining  documenting the ups and downs of singleness, I feel obligated and excited to share these happy experiences, too.

So my ode is actually going to be a tiny haiku.

 

Valentine’s Day

I used to hate you.

But I love your candy and

I have a boyfriend.

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