Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Happy Day before Valentine's Day

This year I look forward to it. Last year, I dreaded it because it was difficult to be dating someone with less...uh...someone who fell into a significantly lower tax bracket. How's that? I worried about how much to spend, how to make him feel ok that he couldn't spend much. That kind of crap. Oh, and I had to go out of my way to spend the evening with him in his truck since he was working nights. So let's just say last year Valentine's day came up a little (or a lot) short. He did better than I expected, to be honest, but overall, nothing came out of what I got anyway - except a bunch of recycling.

This year, my part was done back in January. Still get warm fuzzies from that surprise. I know he's struggling with it and I can't blame him. For a couple that has so much in common, it still isn't easy to deal with those gift giving occasions. Why? Well, because we're in the same tax bracket (although my HUGE bonus this year skews that slightly) and we live comfortably. So we can go buy what we want when we want for the most part.

Add to that it falling on a wednesday night - I curl at 6:30. Last weekend I curled in the ladies bonspiel so there wasn't much free time to plan anything (however, we did win the C event). And this weekend coming up is his fishing weekend. I get to spend it with a dog and two cats. I fully believe I get the greater entertainment value in that deal.

The weekend after that we're heading to the farm. J and T's first trip out there. I haven't been since Thanksgiving and Grandma's funeral so there hasn't been a lot of chances for them to go either. Little nervous about T but he'll survive if he doesn't try to go play with the coyotes.

Back to the big day. I think that holidays have become an excuse. That's the day or time of year you do what's expected then ignore it for the rest of the year. It removes spontaneity from the gestures and ends up with generic, one gift fits all things. We're surrounded by pink and red and white for a month while the "Hallmark Holiday" permeates society. Then it's on to Green for St. Paddy's day, etc. And we buy into it.

I like what I did. The hotel in early January. Yeah, ok, so it wasn't on The Day. But it held much more meaning than something done on a specified day because you have to. At least I think it did.

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