Last weekend, I checked out Walgreen’s selection of Valentine’s Day swag. Ferrero Rocher chocolates? $10.99. Huggable Bear? $49. Generic perfume inspired by Chanel No. 5? $19.99. The special Valentine’s Day coupons promised that K-Y Jelly would be a low $14.99 with your Balance Rewards Card.
Say you’re looking for something swankier. Buy someone roses that won’t die in a day, then take that someone to Bern’s — you’ve used all your Saturday night money for the month. The next two Saturdays are you, your couch, corn nuts, and Natty Light.
Americans spend roughly $17 billion on Valentine’s Day wares. I saw that on the internet and I believe it.
My wallet and I are lucky enough not to have a valentine. That’s worth celebrating. To toast my luck, Sunday, not Saturday, is going to be a holiday for me. I’m calling it St. Bonaventure Day, after the saint of good fortune. His feast day is really July 15, but our calendar is littered with festivities randomly attached to dates, so who cares.
On February 15, I’m going to celebrate all my relationships with no semblance of commitment. The one with the girl I like flirting with but have no interest in dating because I prefer dating men. The one with the man I want to sleep with and only stay friends.
No cards or tchotchkes. No fancy dinner or dessert. Girl gets a text filled with lame innuendo like, Let’s go shoe-shopping. I’m good at finding deals. I’m good at everything ;-). That shit’s free.
Guy gets a KFC Original Recipe two-piece meal. Comes with a side. And a biscuit. $6.99.
In return, I don’t have to text back when my flirt girl hits me with, Let’s do it! And I get to leave, without saying a word, as soon as I drop off the dark meat. Then I laze around my apartment, sans pants, drinking alone, watching Apocalypse Now.
Everybody wins.
If St. Bonnie’s Day doesn’t feel right, I’ll spend February 14, 2016 commemorating the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre of 1929. I’ll make George “Bugs” Moran figurines out of clay and cut out construction paper Tommy guns.
I’m not embattled. I’m not the woman bitter about her single status on the most couple-y day of the year. Nor am I the woman who’s going to vow to honor herself at a ceremony where she marries herself. I love going to dinner and a movie alone, but I won’t do that on Saturday night to prove to complete strangers that I’m oh so independent.
I just don’t do cheesy, especially expensive cheesy.
I do believe in love (platonic love, romantic love, pet-love, self-love, all of it) and believe I may be in love with someone on February 14, 20-whatever. Even then, for the love of money, I won’t be stopping at Walgreen’s for furry animals or eating bananas Foster at Bern’s.
Maybe I won’t celebrate or commemorate anything that year, this year, or any year. February is Black History Month. There’s not much to celebrate there. OK, there’s some. Probably enough for a rousing verse of “Go Down, Moses.”
I’d totally buy a Hallmark card that opened up and played that.
