This morning I woke up to the sound of my alarm ringing at 4:45am, just like any other day. I took a deep breath and cringed as my blankets were pulled back and the cold air embraced my body. In the dark, I scrambled to tie up my housecoat and find some semblance of a clean outfit amongst the clothes strewn haphazardness around my bedroom. I snuck out of the bedroom as quietly as a lumbering 30-week pregnant woman can so as not to disturb my sleeping husband. Just like any other day.
Except today, the man I left in the bed beside me is my Valentine.
Today probably won’t be my favourite Valentine’s Day ever. Now that I am pregnant, there will be no bottles of wine. Now that we are parents, there will be no romantic date. Now that the transit strike has us working opposite hours, we will not only have to forgo the lunch date we planned, but I will hardly see my husband all day.
But is that really what Valentine’s Day is about? The wine? The diners out? The abundance of gifts I’m sure will be waiting for me when I get home (right? right?!)? Maybe. Maybe that is what Valentine’s Day comprises of. But that isn’t what Valentine’s Day is really about. Not at all.
Valentine’s Day can be a contentious holiday. To some, it is all that is wrong with the marketing machine and commercialism. To others, it is a painful reminder of what they don’t have. Still others see it as a loophole to acting unloving to your partner every other day of the year.
To me, it is all about loving. Valentine’s Day shouldn’t be about the money spent or the loneliness felt. And it certainly doesn’t diminish acts of love shown on other days of the year. Valentine’s Day is about seeking out those people in your life who are important to you and making sure that they feel loved. It is about giving our love, without, necessarily, expecting anything back in return. It is a reminder that love, in essence, is an act and not a passive experience.
Lately, I have not been very good at loving the person I should be loving most of all. I committed my life to a man, and instead, my life seems to have taken hold of me. My focus is always on the next task I should be accomplishing and because of that, I often don’t even see this person I am sharing my life with. Often, on my way to go do something very important, I rush right by Dan only to have him stop me and wrap his arms around me. “There.” He says, “Isn’t that nice? It is good to pretend to love your husband every once in a while.”
I am sure we have all gotten to this point in our relationships. That point where we suck at showing love. Perhaps emotions get in the way and we are too hurt or angry to focus on actively loving. Or maybe we are stuck in a cycle of selfishly desiring love instead of realizing that perhaps our spouse needs love too. For me, life gets in the way. Everything I love – my child, my passions, my desire to check things off a list – gets in the way of the one I chose to love.
So this is why Valentine’s Day is so great. This is why I am so thrilled that our society has embraced a day all about love. Because once a year, something chubby and diapered and only half as cute as my son shoots and arrow right in the middle of our relationships and reminds us to turn up the love volume. And even if your relationship is full of fireworks and rainbows on February 13th, it never hurts to try a little harder to show the people in our lives how much we love them.
Don’t wallow in self-pitty today. Don’t count the amount of dollars spent. Don’t just be loving today on this one day. Pick out those people in your life who mean everything to you and love them better. Valentine’s Day is a reminder to love. Today. Tomorrow. Every day. Maybe you don’t need that reminder. I do.
What my husband and son woke up to. I hope they know how desperately I love them.
Laura, I’m sure they do know how desperately you love them. I love reading your introspective, self-reflective observations. I especially like that you distinguish how much we get focused on what we desire in being loved at the expense of doing the loving. That recognition has brought me back into right relationship with my husband many times. And life does get in the way of our intention to love fully so having ourselves reminded of that is a very good thing – even if it’s by a chubby baby with an arrow, lol. And HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!
Thank you so much, Mary!
I think that is the key to any long-lasting marriage – ACTIVELY loving. When people tell me they “fell out of love” I hear that their marriage was built on a feeling, and feelings are fleeting. 1 Corinthians 13 talks about love as a verb. It is all about doing and being, not receiving. When two people are engaged in loving each other, then receiving love is a beautiful by-product. I could go on and on about this! :) I am actually very passionate about it. It was this type of conversation I had with my husband that made him fall in love with me, actually! :)
I am thankful for these days when I am reminded.
Laura recently posted..Any Other Day
Always so poignant and beautiful. I know Dan and Cam KNOW you love then because I can FEEL it through your words as I read them. You are an amazing wife, mother and friend amongst many other amazing hats you wear. Happy life of loving. Happy birthday my friend.
Oh Kinga. THANK YOU. What a beautifully sweet comment. I am so humbled. Happy life of loving to YOU and Happy Valentine’s Day!
Laura recently posted..Any Other Day
Lovely post Laura. I too struggle with remembering to show my husband that I love him. And oh… HAPPY BIRTHDAY! For some reason I never forget when yours is. I even remember how old you are, because you’re only a few days older than my hubby :) I hope you had a nice Valentines Day in the end, and I hope that even if Dan didn’t do too much special for it he DID remember to get you a little something something for your birthday!
Emily recently posted..My Skirt-Wearing Secrets
I find it SO funny that you know my birthday off the top of your head. :D
To tell you the truth, I started writing this post at the beginning of the day. By the time I posted it though, my husband had already done so many wonderful things for me – and my day was so much more incredible than I ever could have anticipated. *I* am so lucky and loved!
I hope you and your hubby have had and continue to have a lovely Valentine’s Day!
Laura recently posted..Any Other Day
I loved this post Laura–I think there’s a lot of wisdom there in embracing Valentine’s Day as a day that we could both do better at loving each other!
Meredith @ La Buena Vida recently posted..Throwback
Thank you so much Meredith! I think that when people start to get bogged down (and angry, jaded, etc) by how society is treating a holiday, it means we have forgotten how to make it relevant to our lives. I definitely think Valentine’s Day is one of those holidays that can be relevant and can better our lives if we let it.
Laura recently posted..Make-Down: Faces of a Family
Yes, they know. They KNOW. But it doesn’t hurt to show love, even in the smallest of ways every so often. I too, get caught up in the day to day, and sometimes, forget that even a little kindness to my husband, IS an act of love. I have to do better :)
Alison@Mama Wants This recently posted..Lost
Don’t we all? And here I am (replying to this comment WAY too late) reminding myself AGAIN to try to do better. Sigh. We can’t ever stop trying to do better for the ones we love, can we? It is good to have reminders!
Laura recently posted..Make-Down: Faces of a Family
Such a wonderful post! V-day is a reminder we should do sweet actions more often!
Natalie recently posted..Getting to Know You
Thanks Natalie!
Laura recently posted..Make-Down: Faces of a Family
Yes, absolutely! Very well put. It’s soo easy for life to get in the way of love. I too seem to need this reminder from time to time.