I don’t know why it is that EVERY Valentine’s day, it’s the same memory.

The only lousy Valentine’s Day of my entire life and it pops up without fail, every stinkin’ year.

Well, here it is again…Valentine’s Day, right on schedule, and like a thorn in my side, the ONE lousy memory is right there with it!

I know I hang on to people and stuff too tight and too long but fifty six years?

Actually, I’m over it, honest, a long-time-ago over it but still there it is……. February 14, 1962.
It pops smack-up into my head just like my daily reminders from my computer….my electronic brain, telling me what day it is and what I’m suppose to be doing.

I had a boyfriend.
He’d been my boyfriend most all the way through high school.
It was my senior year.
He was away at college and I missed him horrible.
I wrote to him every day.
I professed my teen-aged love and the ache in my heart for how much I missed him.
Like most teenagers of the time, we loved our music.
He couldn’t go off his “grounds” to buy records, so I sent him the latest hits.
One record cost 2 hours of my babysitting wages, which was 50 cents an hour.
Yep…..that long ago!

He couldn’t come home for Christmas his first year and so I went there.
It was almost fairy tale wonderful except I had to share him with his family and his family had to share him with me.
But still we found some alone time amidst it all and…..made some memories.
(Hmmm, I wonder if he remembers the top of the stairwell in that dark, empty building?)

I returned home floating and head over heels in love.
At the same time, I was broken-hearted that we had to be so far apart.

Two short months later, it was Valentine’s Day.
I had sent off my card with all my love inside and anxiously awaited what I’d get from him.
He was clever.
He’d make it special.
He’d write something unforgettable, I could barely wait.

I was right, it WAS unforgettable!!!

I hadn’t heard from him as often since I’d come back from my Christmas visit.
I knew how hard he applied himself to his studies so I didn’t think much of it.
I mean, this is the guy who asked one of his buddies to take me tobogganing with the group one time when he had to stay home and study!
He loaned out his girlfriend!
I should have wised-up then!

I hurried home from school that day and my mom held his letter in her hands knowing how I’d been waiting for it.
I flew to the privacy of my room, jumped on my bed and tore open the envelope.

The first sentence put a knife in my heart and the rest of his words turned that knife ever so slowly.

His timing?
Did he do that on purpose?
WHY?

You guessed it my dear reader friends…..a break-up letter right smack on Valentine’s Day!!

WHO does that?
Right on Valentine’s Day!!!
WHO?

My sweet husband of today tells me that every sad event has X amount of tears attached to it and, the last tear will eventually come.

I stopped going to school for a few days, I just stayed home trying to get to that last tear.
My heart was the broken-heart that every sad song on the radio sang about.

But, that last tear did eventually came and before too long another special day rolled around…..my birthday.

My broken-heart was healing and I’d been noticing it doing that old flip-flop feeling that I hadn’t felt for a while.
It happened every time a certain boy came into sight in the hallways between classes.

With a little hinting to his buddy that I wish he’d ask me out……like magic, he asked me out!
It was my birthday.
It was a VERY surprising date and when it was over, I had his class ring clutched in my hand but……………………that’s another story.

The Valentine’s Guy?

We never really let go.
We have an interesting but strange, and very weird friendship.

I make sure he always remembers that heartless incident.
He’s apologized many, many times for his thoughtless, rotten timing and has suggested many times that I “get over it.”

I AM “over it.”
But once a year just as I’m reminded, well it’s only right that so should he.

Whadd’ya think, reader friends of mine?
I think he needs a BIG BOOOOO!

………………………………………

I don’t often do this but I’d like to dedicate this little story to you, my UNValentine.
You’ve allowed me to rib you every single year and you take it.
This is NOT to say I forgive you. I DON’T!
Or, that you won’t be reminded next year because YOU WILL!
Just, I’m glad somehow we never really lost each other.
I would have missed you.

Happy Valentine’s Day, BF.
xxx