Last night, I went to a Pens hockey game and watched a guy propose to his girlfriend on the Kiss Cam during the third period. She looked a little surprised, it was sweet, she said yes, they kissed, and he put the ring on her finger. Everyone in the arena went wild.
Today, my coworker got a special delivery of flowers to the office from her boyfriend. We all begged her to open them, put them in water, and show us all how pretty they were.
My parents and my in-laws sent us cards in the mail, each with the perfect words in them to their daughter and son to put smiles on our faces and show how much they care.
I woke up to a text from my mom that said the words “I love you” no less than three times in the same text.
The receptionist at my client’s office wished me a happy Valentine’s Day as I walked out after my meeting.
These are just a smattering of examples. But the truth is there. People love love.
We may hate to be in the group of people who “celebrate” Valentine’s Day. We may cringe at the pink and the hearts and the roses and the cards. We may loathe the obligations and the high-priced four-course dinners and the typically gender-stereotyped displays of holiday marketing.
But I’m telling you, we can’t get enough of this feeling of love.
Valentine’s Day makes a lot of married people (okay, maybe women) think about their wedding day. The vows, the kiss, the dancing, the laughter. That was a day to celebrate love. Completely, truly, unequivocally. The first day of a long life full of love.
Marriage is so many things. It’s a commitment, it’s compromise, it’s political, it’s religious, it’s arranged, it’s forbidden, it’s hard, it’s beautiful. And yet, at the end of the day, no matter your experience with marriage, we all still just love love.
We smile, perhaps longingly, at the elderly couple who still enjoys a night out at a hockey game. We giggle at the young couple on their first date. We cheer and clap when we see the proposal on the jumbotron. We can’t help it. We are smitten. Our own hearts swell at the sight of two people who can’t get enough of each other.
Yet as much as we honor this beautiful, messy, glorious love, we are only reminded to celebrate it once a year. We have this one Hallmark holiday each year when people are reminded to tell their partners and friends and family how much they mean to them. But this shouldn’t be the only day we smile when our partner hands us a flower. It shouldn’t be the only time we think to buy a card. It shouldn’t be the one day a year when we make time for the people we couldn’t live without.
I love that Valentine’s Day is a celebration of love, but the celebration should continue year-round. Let this be the first day, not the only day, that you commit to telling people you love them. Tell them tomorrow. Tell them next week. Take them out to dinner next month. Not for a holiday. Not “just” because. But because you love them. And you love love.