DEAR VALENTINE


So here We are, once again. Valentine’s Day, when Love is reduced to pink and red (the colors of wounds), hearts and apparently naked children holding weapons. It’s an unusual but safe way to categorize what we can’t really describe, replace what we can not or will not express with symbols we can avoid explaining.

You and I, however, are different. Our love is secret. There is apparently no place for this Love, my Love. It does not beg for court intervention nor political gain. It does not need approval from anyone.

This Love is not criticized directly but everywhere one looks are subtle offers to avoid it - Friendster, chat lines, “Reality” shows, ad campaigns. magazines. The message is clear : being alone is to be avoided, usually at all costs. You can be ignorant, you can be cynical, you can be manipulative and manipulated but whatever you do, you must surround yourself with others.

Here is where we’re different. We = I. I like being single and like being alone, in the “human” sense of course since Polly is always with me. I like having my apartment just the way I want. I like watching what I want on TV or not watching anything at all. I can watch the Simpsons three times a day and t’aint nobody’s business if I do. I can buy a giant size container of egg salad from the deli and spread it on Carr’s Wheat Crackers 24/7. I hold out a small piece for Polly on the edge of the butter knife like fine caviar and watch her delicately lean over and pluck it off the edge with the tip of her tongue.

We enjoy it, me and me and me and me. We have good times. People may view me sympathetically when I tell them I spent Saturday night home. Inside I am smiling, thinking of egg salad and the Simpsons. How Polly slept on my shoulder while I was on my computer, looking happy and perfect which is reason enough to adore her. I think about how much I’m in Love with my World and Me in it.

Skip the flowers, skip the chocolates, I’m frankly not a big sweets fan. Skip the gaudy card, if you can’t say it all the time, it probably doesn’t need to be said. Skip the misguided romanticism. All the crap about “The One”, “Forever and Ever”, “Meant to Be”. I am not a Searching Half who dreams of Something or Someone else to come along and complete me like a puzzle. An Incomplete Puzzle is just Incomplete and in itself is Something to Love.

So, I Love you. AIDS, wild eyebrow hairs, Dunhills, quirky glasses, magic, pills. Perfection. The Bomb. I wouldn’t have you any other way because this is how We are. You rock. But you already know that.

xxx

2:57:34 PM    sro home /