By Kara Hallam
Enterprise Editor
@KaraHallam
It was my first Valentine’s Day ever with an actual date last year. Eagerly, I bought all the typical paraphernalia at Tom Thumb for my boyfriend like chocolates, balloons and an oversized cute stuffed animal.
The day of, I walked to my boyfriend’s car, carrying my gifts and trying to see if I could see his presents for me through the car window. We had been dating for eight months so as I plopped my all the gifts into the backseat I slid into the car super excited to see what he had gotten me.
“Open the glove box, your gift is in there,” he said.
I opened the glove box to find a mini-box of chocolates, thinking it was a little small but knowing I was just being selfish and materialistic. Except then I noticed it was an all peanut kind; the kind I’m allergic too.
I noted it, to which he replied, “Oh, I guess I picked the wrong one up from the stash my mom gave us this morning.”
Confused, and apprehensively about to crack, I dared to ask the question, “From your mom’s stash?”
“Well, I didn’t want to go out and drive so I just gave you something from what she got us. I guess I picked up the wrong one,” my boyfriend said.
From here on out the rest of this anecdote goes completely down hill.
Many of us have our Valentine’s Day horror stories like these, a testament to the awful things that come with this holiday. I have heard so many times before; ‘we all hate Valentine’s Day it’s pointless and dumb and awkward and none of us know why it is still a nationally celebrated holiday’.
And yet, it’s not going anywhere. So I thought, maybe instead of dreading the holiday in the days to come, we all find a way to actually enjoy it.
I’ve spent time on both sides of the awful Valentine’s Day spectrum from forever alone to dates gone horribly wrong, so I think I can give you a pretty fair analysis on how to start feeling better.
After all, what can be so bad about a holiday where $1.6 billion are spent annually on candy?
Try to go into things with a positive attitude. The first step to enjoying something, is opening up your mind to it. We are entering upon a holiday where there is free candy everywhere.
Say: “I’m going to enjoy this holiday, not because I think someone’s going to buy me something, or a secret admirer will magically appear, or my girlfriend will magically not want to go out or my boyfriend will actually make the day perfect.”
Positive thoughts lead to a positive life. You just have to choose to get over the things in the past and start anew.
For those who know me, you might be thinking ‘what does she know, she and her long-term boyfriend make googly eyes at each other all the time.’ But while I do have an amazing boyfriend, he is also that guy who gave me a box of re-gifted peanut chocolates and I am the girl with high expectations.
Love takes time, and imagining that a beaux will suddenly make Valentine’s Day a dream come true is unrealistic.Valentine’s Day horror stories exist because we are expecting an ideal of perfection and constantly get let down. If we take the pressure off, things are much less likely to go wrong.
The hardest thing in my relationship is to get out of the Coppell ideal of perfect relationships. My boyfriend spent most of his life in California, a land where they don’t make big shows of dance invites and gifts. Embarrassingly enough, it took a lot of effort to realize that roses and chocolates and dates don’t mean anything (ouch, still pains my stereotypical teenage girl self to say it).
Luckily for all of us, Valentine’s Day takes place on a Saturday this year. Insecure girls of the world will be spared of the sight of enormous teddy bears crushing their self-esteems at school.
That is, as long as you stay off social media as well.
Although Coppell shouldn’t have been dubbed the snobbiest city in the state, the rankings weren’t completely off. The in your face tweets and posts can become almost competition like.
When you see someone get something really cute be happy for them, gestures like these are what makes the holiday, not ruin it. It doesn’t have to make you feel alone, but rather just be happy that someone else is.
Be grateful for what you do have. Perfect significant others are just as much as a best friend as a non-romantic one. It doesn’t matter what kind of best friend you have, they will always be a blast to celebrate with.
My boyfriend, before anything else, is my best friend, and that’s who I would really want to spend Valentine’s Day with instead of a date.
Also, don’t get me wrong there are those couples who can have the perfect Valentine’s Day or ones who see beyond all the hype and truly love each other. Just relax, be happy and it’ll get there.
The ones who are enjoying Valentine’s Day romantically took time and compromise to build their relationships and understand how to care for the one they love. Sparks weren’t immediate and practice was required to get it right.
It all just depends on how you make it.
