Will You Be My Valentine?

11:49 February 14, 2010...Valentine's Day...


Valentine's Day through out the ages (well my ages anyway):
2 Years Ago: One of the more tolerable years of this holiday's ritual - which consisted of "True Love" mixers, and V-Day bar specials. Drinking excessively with other single friends and wearing some sort of red or pink....simple enough right? If there was anything which involved over the top displays of public affection, I don't remember much of it- which was the whole point really.
Can we reflect on the idea of a "True Love Mixer" or V-Day Bar party? Granted I've met most of my ex-boyfriends at a bar, and I'm finally seeing the light past the neon Budweiser sign. They're ex's for a reason. Then again it's Valentine's Day right? We all need something to take the edge off. Its an added bonus if you find Mr. Right, or Mr. Right-Now(his ugly bastard cousin, damn him).

7 Years Ago: Let's call it "THE Day of 'Surprise' Romantic Gestures" (cough* notice the sarcasm, hint hint)....all day long. flowers delivered, gifts given, etc etc. You get it. All under the watchful eye of the entire student population.

13 Years Ago: This Valentine's Day, I remember most fondly. At 10 years old (& younger) we had certain V-Day traditions at school. The whole class would make valentines day boxes - like a US post box, hand made....as much glitter and paper mache hearts that could fill a 4th grade class room. Each hung from the front of our desks or back of our chairs (depending on your style). On the fateful day we'd have a class party naturally, filled with sweethearts and...Scooby Doo Valentines (Note: Scooby Doo Valentine's reference is probably 100% inaccurate as I can't remember the Valentine fad of the day).
Things were simpler then...then again I'm pretty sure my 10 year old self would adamantly disagree with that statement. Even then...our 10 year old lives were in upheaval with the gossip that Kevin was proclaiming his undying love to Katie Walsh and Joe gave a gold locket to Catherine Fox. (Note: I'm pretty positive those names and sentiments of love, ARE true :) I have a mind like a steal trap when it comes to things that really do matter. Right.)

Let's flash forward to present day. Joy. It's officially 12:10pm on Saint Valentines Day. I - am in sweats, indulging in a cup of coffee with "Live Your Life" jammin on my ipod. Typing away on my Anti-Love life blog. In all seriousness though, even in my darkest, most bitter and broken hearted of hours, I've never taken it out on the holiday (aka been an Anti-Valentine). The truth is while I may have, and continue to, roll my eyes at the over the top & slightly unnecessary displays of love and affection, I've always participated in my own way. My kitchen table is adorned with beautiful flowers....from a great girl friend :).

I've always been of the belief that I'd rather be alone or "celebrating" (however that may materialize) than have a Valentine just to have one. I DO have a decently entertaining V-Day story from college, I feel like I should show some compassion and restraint though because he was always so sweet to me.....oh wait a second, a light bulb just went off.

I'm spilling it.
I was "dating" this guy in college my Junior year, just a couple of weeks prior to Valentine's Day. Let's call him "Cubs Fan in Alabama"...(that probably doesn't resonate with most people but I'm wild about the Chicago Cubs - an automatic characteristic of any Cubs fan is undying loyalty....through ups and downs, downs that materialize into a100 year losing streak, seriously. - all of this could have amounted to  some of the over powering reasons I decided to entertain the idea of dating him). We hadn't made plans to get together on the holiday and to be honest that was fine by me. I was in this weird stage of figuring out how I felt about the quasi relationship, or if it should continue at all.
We had barely kissed. So did I expect anything on Valentine's? Absolutely not. Far from it.

I walk into my apartment, 11:45am after my 10am whatever it was class to find my roommate and one of my best friends stilling on the couch grinning from ear to ear. I follow her eyes to a nice display of flowers arranged in a vase on the living room table. "Oh how great, XXX (< Insert roommate's boyfriend's name here) did very good for himself this year!". Then she says without skipping a beat "Woah woah don't get ahead of yourself, these are addressed to you".

This is a good time to interject and add that while I liked "Cubs Guy in Alabama", and enjoyed his company, I wasn't quite sure as to what sort of like this was. The awkward timing / arrival of Valentines Day wasn't helping my decision making process or cause.

The card read: "Molly, I'm very sorry that we couldn't spend Valentine's Day together. Let these flowers be proof that I am thinking of you all the while." (Note: Not quoted verbatim, just via memory, sue me.)
Sweet right? But I thought....Oh my God, thats so sweet....too sweet really...."Under Pressure" by Queen & David Bowie playing on repeat in my head.

So I leave an hour later for my next class with the weight of his sweet gesture bearing down of my shoulders. I come back home to a similar scene as before, an over the top gift basket display sitting next to my flowers on the table and my roommate's grin is even bigger, this time accompanied by giggling. Surely THIS was from her boyfriend, she interjects my reeling heads thought process and says "...don't look at me, that's yours - round two". ---Gift basket filled with cookies, candy, a tiger stuffed animal conveniently named after him, and a flamingo loofah. Yes that's right, a flamingo loofah. (?!). Holy shit. The V-Day/relationship pressure just went from 50 to 200.

Needless to say these gifts were basically the straw that broke the camels back. I felt awkward and guilty continuing a relationship that I wasn't sure about vs. one who he felt so strongly about. If this was the end of the story, I wouldn't have shared it...but as you can guess its not the end. Oh with me, its never the end.

From the time of the Valentine's Day extravaganza to the next point of this story 1 year must have gone by. Complete with friendly exchanges via text message or facebook occasionally until that fateful day... I was back in Auburn, visiting for a weekend to celebrate a girlfriend's graduation and I decided to text "Cubs Guy in Alabama" just to see what he was up to. After all we were on friendly terms & had hung out a bit since so I thought why not? We texted back and forth and I quickly found out that he was in Birmingham for the summer working so he wouldn't be able to get together.

15 minutes go by and I get a text from him it said:
"I just heard from Molly and not only am I stuck in Birmingham slaving my life away at this job - I also won't be in Auburn tonight having sex because of it....'

That's right. He sent that text to me vs. whoever the intended recipient was.
Shocked, i thought about it for a couple minutes until I wrote this back:

"Dear "Cubs Guy in Alabama",
I don't think that this text was intended for me. Need I encourage you to get your facts straight...we never had sex, nor came close to it. Please don't mislead your friends, especially when my name is in the sentence. Thanks."

"p.s. It's safe for you to assume that we will never be having sex."

Happy Valentines Day! It's not over yet....still 12 hours, anything can happen.
xoxo-M

As Always, Stay Tuned

Prologue

In the longevity of this blog I am looking to answer the five W's of any substantial writing piece. (Props to my college Journalism professor of freshman year - who's name presently escapes me...then again you did torture me along with 30+ of my classmates so that serves you right.)

Who  - Me. Molly. I consider myself your "normal", everyday American girl. But then again what is normal anyway? I'm 23, and am currently completely diving into the part of my life that most consider "independence". I moved away from all forms of family and friends, to a completely new state and part of the country, in an effort to embrace said independence to its fullest extent.

One of the things not so normal about me is my tendency to accumulate dating stories that would fit seamlessly into Seinfield episodes. Don't get me wrong, I love Seinfield....however on the other hand having your daily life play out like it could be showcased during prime time on a major national network - its not as funny as you'd think. Just kidding, it is funny.

Which brings me to What and Why. I'm tired of people claiming to have all the answers....so let it be stated that this blog is NOT IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM meant to act as a Single Girls Guide to anything...at all...ever. I don't have the answers and at this point I'm not sure I ever will. This blog is meant to showcase the fumblings, failures, disasters and hilarity that all boil down to finding the right guy. Kissing the frogs to find the prince.

When and Where....are irrelevant when I really think about it. This story has happened a million times over to women around the world, throughout time. If you can't relate to it then I feel bad for you...this is the stuff of life.

As always, stay tuned.