Happy Valentine's Day!

It's Valentine's Day, or VD, (insert 5th grade snickering here) today. My feelings about Valentine's Day haven't changed at all since my post last year, Why I Hate Valentine's Day, so I won't go into that again.

Several things that have happened this week have reminded once again of why I have a love/hate relationship with this holiday. I was reminded of the good during a conversation with my little brother a few days ago about some of his childhood memories of Valentine's Day. He, like me, is somewhat indifferent about Valentine's Day now but remembers every Valentine's Day of our childhood with great affection. And when I gave it some thought and wiped some of the cobwebs away, I remembered great things too, including:

• wearing red ribbons in my hair to match a carefully selected red outfit
• planning out the design/decoration for my Valentine box weeks in advance
• picking out *the perfect* Valentine's to share with my classmates and then sitting at the kitchen table for hours while I carefully signed them and stuffed them into their little envelopes
• Mom making heart shaped pancakes
• being dazzled by playing our Atari, a Valentine gift in 1980 or 1981

But I have also been reminded of the bad as I watched a friend feel "the pressure" of creating a perfect Valentine's Day for a girl that he has been dating for a short time. I listened as he told me about the teddy bear he had ordered from Vermont Teddy Bear Company that would be delivered to her office and the jewelry he planned to present to her on tonight only to feel his palpable disappointment when she gave him the "let's just be friends" blow off yesterday.

However you chose or don't chose to celebrate Valentine's Day, I hope today is a good day for you and one when you are surrounded by people and things that you love. I hope that you don't feel the pressure to make any grand gestures but rather remember to love and be true to yourself.