Valentine's Day
I have a love hate relationship with Valentine's day. I think spending 50 to 100 dollars on flowers is the ultimate waste of money...but part of me really wants pretty flowers, oxymoron of the highest degree. I'm perfectly content with the $5 special from the grocery store or the pretty Orchid at the home improvement store that I'll kill in a few months...they are pretty and sweet. (I'd scream if Joe spent our money on crazy expensive flowers). I'm practical...PLEASE NO ROSES...ESPECIALLY RED ONES, so played out and fortunately my husband knows better.
Then there is the Valentine Date. At our age we almost end at dinner and a movie, we generally do that on date night any way but today it would cost more. We are going outside the box. Our local farmers market has their indoor market today. We are going for brunch, live music and chocolate covered strawberries. (Which you can eat and are better than flowers any day). It below freezing and the movie theater here is always cold so we are skipping the movies and coming home to curl up on the couch to watch TV and play a game by the fire. (Hold your breath because there may be some really romantic laundry washing going on simultaneously).
Yes, love deserves a day of recognition, but like every other holiday it has become an over commercialized mess. They start selling cards for Valentine's day at Christmas and the Easter peeps are already on display beside the Russe Stover candy heart boxes. Enough is enough.
I've already alluded to changes taking place in my life and my approach to living. Less stuff and less commercial junk is one of those priorities. The happiest people I have met in my life have little by way of possession and their time is free because they are not having to maintain a status quo.
I wish I would have figured this out when I was much younger...what a difference it would have made in the lives of my children.
Don't mistake me, I'm not bitter. I'm FINALLY learning from my mistakes and from the mistakes of those around me. I'm observing more and talking less. I'm developing wisdom instead in of furthering my intelligence. You really don't get it, until the time comes and you get it. Suddenly you see ever mistake clearly and you have to make a decision to wallow is regret or learn and grow. I've wallow ed in regret and self pity plenty in my life and it does NOTHING but add to your misery, I've decided to take stock and learn from my past. Don't worry, I'll screw up some more, but maybe this time I can do it with a little more grace.
Happy Valentine's Day. Leave the flowers in the garden and your money in the bank. ;)
Then there is the Valentine Date. At our age we almost end at dinner and a movie, we generally do that on date night any way but today it would cost more. We are going outside the box. Our local farmers market has their indoor market today. We are going for brunch, live music and chocolate covered strawberries. (Which you can eat and are better than flowers any day). It below freezing and the movie theater here is always cold so we are skipping the movies and coming home to curl up on the couch to watch TV and play a game by the fire. (Hold your breath because there may be some really romantic laundry washing going on simultaneously).
Yes, love deserves a day of recognition, but like every other holiday it has become an over commercialized mess. They start selling cards for Valentine's day at Christmas and the Easter peeps are already on display beside the Russe Stover candy heart boxes. Enough is enough.
I've already alluded to changes taking place in my life and my approach to living. Less stuff and less commercial junk is one of those priorities. The happiest people I have met in my life have little by way of possession and their time is free because they are not having to maintain a status quo.
I wish I would have figured this out when I was much younger...what a difference it would have made in the lives of my children.
Don't mistake me, I'm not bitter. I'm FINALLY learning from my mistakes and from the mistakes of those around me. I'm observing more and talking less. I'm developing wisdom instead in of furthering my intelligence. You really don't get it, until the time comes and you get it. Suddenly you see ever mistake clearly and you have to make a decision to wallow is regret or learn and grow. I've wallow ed in regret and self pity plenty in my life and it does NOTHING but add to your misery, I've decided to take stock and learn from my past. Don't worry, I'll screw up some more, but maybe this time I can do it with a little more grace.
Happy Valentine's Day. Leave the flowers in the garden and your money in the bank. ;)
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