(to make your own paper heart: http://www.instructables.com/id/Heart-Note-Fold/)
“We accept the love we think we deserve.” ? Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower
I’m hoping to post for real today, but I just saw that quote on Twitter (tweeted by no less a figure than Newark mayor Cory Booker, who I follow and if you’re on Twitter, you should, too) and it just punched me in the solar plexus.
For all the reasons that everyone else like me is not much into Valentine’s Day, I’m not much into Valentine’s Day: It’s a corporate construct, romance is not a matter of flowers and chocolate, why should one day be more about love than the other 364(5)… etc, etc, ad nauseum. At dinner, I’ll give my beloveds handmade cards in which I tell each of them something about them that I love, and we’ll decorate homemade heart-shaped brownies together. I don’t generally get much of anything from anyone on Valentine’s Day (though last night the husband did get me some Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups), but I’m kind of cool with that — it’s my day to make my family heart-shaped brownies.
But that quote, man. That quote! That’s a thing to ring in your ears and shape the way you live your life.
What kind of love do I think I deserve? What kind of love do I want my children to think they deserve? How do I live my life in a way that helps others know themselves worthy of genuine, affirming, soul-breathing love? And the people out there accepting something less than that — who taught them to think that’s all they deserve?
So: Happy Valentine’s Day! Please find someone you love and tell them so, in a way that only they can hear. Romance — or any of love’s many forms — is not, in fact, flowers and chocolates. It’s treating someone like you know that they deserve great love, even on those days when they’re not sure.
(And apparently now I have another book to read).
i love this.
And I love you! xo
Happy Valentine’s Day, boss!
i can usually go all day confident in the complaint that valentines day lacks substance. now i can’t. thanks emily, i’m gonna have that quote floating in my head all day instead. :)
You know what says love? Alan Rickman. Great post, ee.
Alan Rickman -
DIPPED IN DARK CHOCOLATE.
Bringing me a pizza. #heaven
I’m not much into Valentines Day, myself & this year especially when it happens to be the 100th Birthday of Arizona becoming our 48th State in these United States.
For the last few years, there has been more pain and sorrow for a lot of folks who live here even those who can count their families back for generations, than a day to celebrate.
One of my neighbors hung his American flag out this morning with black tape over that 48th star. Some of us in AZ have a big sad today.
Valentine’s Day in AZ was always bittersweet for me. Many of my friends have family that was there prior to statehood, and my mom was a HS teacher on the reservation. All these native people spend their Valentines hearing how awesome America is, and how lucky they are to be here. So sad that most of my white friends never understood that dynamic, and how offensive they could be.
As my late mother once put it — “You don’t need the people who hurt you.”
My plan to make it through Valentine’s Day without crying has just failed. Not because of the tweeted quote, but because of this: “It’s treating someone like you know that they deserve great love, even on those days when they’re not sure.” Absolutely, heart-breakingly beautiful.
Awww!
I send you a heart-shaped box of kleenex! We all emerge into this world deserving great love. It’s just that not all of us get told that.
I’m very lucky this Valentine’s Day. Someone wonderful is in my life.
And none of it has anything to do with Hallmark Holiday nonsense.