The Perfect V-Day

Like many holidays, Valentine's Day has become a huge commercial extravaganza. The ads on TV, the Internet, and newspapers building up the day to huge proportions, leaving everyone with unrealistic expectations that are generally not met. Leaving people who are not in a relationship feeling "less" and old married people "left out".

My youngest brother, Paul, is going through a divorce and Valentines was this huge depressing time he just had to make it through. He got on the Internet and began to search for singles and Valentines, being alone on Valentine, etc. It really help him put things into perspective. According to the information he found, most people in a relationship at Valentine find it very stressful and are more often than not let-down or upset with the outcome. Many online resources say that single people tend to have a better holiday - because they have no expectations. Nor or they held up to others expectations.

With the financial strain we've been under the last few years, having a five year old and no where to leave him for an evening, and just being comfortable in our stay-at-homeness, this holiday wasn't approached with much expectation. Which turned out to be a good thing as Will come down with a fever and sore throat and Steve ended up spending all of Saturday helping my brother move.

However, the absence of expectation left open the opportunity for a nice unstressful holiday. On Saturday, I was surprised by the arrival of a dozen mixed roses and a box of chocolate. Steve would much rather pick up flowers at the store and deliver them himself - so this meant so much more. Even while taking care of my sick son, I felt special, loved. Unaware the flowers were delivered, and not wanting to show up with nothing, Steve stopped at the store late Saturday on his way home and picked me up a batch of flowers. Yep, I got two rose arrangements, and chocolates for V-day.

And no, I didn't forget the hubby. I got him a present too - beer.

We didn't go out today. We didn't even buy lunch or dinner and have it delivered. We watched TV, a few of Will's movies, and just sit around. It was a quite day filled with ease and family.

The perfect V-day as far as I'm concerned.