Our Valentine's Weekend

This was our first COVID-era Valentine’s Day. Since Valentine’s Day was on a Sunday and was cold and wet outside, we made it a Valentine’s Weekend. It is normal for us to spend a lot of time together, but since COVID introduced itself we have been together even more, so much so that we could not buy each other cards separately. We were both trying to think of a way to get to a store without it being obvious to each other. Kathy finally said, “I have to go to CVS.

So, after we took one of our cats to the vet on Saturday, we went to CVS and picked out cards for each other together. I also bought Kathy some CVS flowers and a package of little candy sweethearts. Kathy being Kathy was not going to only give me a card though-- I was surprised with three boxes of out-of-this-world Harry and David Fine Chocolates that were delivered to our door during our celebration on Saturday. When I saw the name of the candy I said, “Sounds like winemakers.” She answered, “They have wine too, but the state of Alabama wouldn’t let them deliver.”

We woke up the next morning to Valentine’s Day, but it was only the half point in our Valentine’s Weekend. We went to our favorite restaurant and then came home and celebrated some more.

I wish there were more commercialized holidays. We both love to make them work for us.

I posted the above three paragraphs on my Facebook page, along with the acknowledgement that I knew not everyone was going to get a kick out of my post. Some people do not like PDAs and others have their reasons, but if it makes Kathy happy to see it, that’s all that matters.

I have learned that it is best to squeeze every little drop of what I can out of whatever I have to squeeze it out of, so I do not worry too much about what others take from what I post, but as usual when I post something like that, there were many of our Facebook friends who were happy for us.

Kathy and I are living in the moment now, and getting as much out of life as possible, but since we are retired, empty nesters, we do have a lot of time to talk about memories. Some things, I remember and some things she remembers. Some things we both remember, but we remember differently because we were affected by the experience differently.

Last year we were reminiscing about shared experiences before we were married, and I became a little sad because neither of us could remember many details-- we usually only remember the circumstances around the experience. I got past the sadness when I realized that we did not remember many of the details because it was a happy, carefree time in both of our lives. Those happy times tend to be bundled in a block with the rest of the happy times in a timeframe. We have been so superfantabulous for each other that a big portion of our lives is one big block of superfantabulous. If it had been rough for us, we would have remembered the worst times in detail. That is just how it works, but I had to get some age on me before I realized it.

That is why you should take lots and lots of pictures with smiling faces. You need positive memories to counter the negative. When I’m writing, I have no trouble remembering bad experiences that make a good story but aren’t pleasant to recall. Pictures with smiles help me recall the good times. It is also why I occasionally write a story to go along with the pictures.