Valentine Curve Ball

February 4th, 2010 | Author: Greta

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I was all set to write about alternative gifts for the Valentine-minded human being. Oh, yes, flowers, fine; chocolates, great; champagne, good. But I thought there is some uncharted Valentine territory that does not involve THINGS. (And, no, I don’t mean Horizontal Hula coupons: This certificate entitles the bearer to one headache-free evening with the wife. Those coupons always get lost or are invalidated upon attempted use because, “We’re having company tomorrow and the kitchen is a mess.”) I was very excited to explore alternative ways of saying ‘I love you,’ but then I read this blog by Carla Zilbersmith.

If you are on active duty as a reader of Saving Private Mommy, you may be familiar with Carla Zilbersmith of Carla’s Calendars fame. If not, permit me to give you the crash course: Incredibly wise, talented, loving and beloved human being is suffering a prolonged, painful, if not torturous, death from ALS, commonly know as Lou Gehrig’s Disease.

I know. It’s the season of St. Valentine. I promised you 14 Days of Love and Food and I’m giving you Too Many Minutes of Death and Depression. But I couldn’t help but see the link to gift-giving on Valentine’s Day. I hope you’ll permit me to mix a little Grim Reaper in with our naked cherub friend. If we’re lucky, I’ll throw in a leprechaun by the end.

Back to Carla. She was diagnosed with ALS after several falls and some loss of mobility in her hand and legs. That was three years ago. Now she sits in a wheelchair unable to care for herself in the most basic ways: eating, going to the bathroom, grooming, walking, even picking up a blanket that has fallen off of her in the night. Her speech, a longtime accomplice to her razor-sharp mind, is failing. She is losing the ability to swallow. She will soon lose the ability to breathe.

This clearly has everything to do with Valentine’s Day. Diamond commercials, rumors about Brangelina, a sapphire ring from the husband, good-looking people across the globe getting naked and risking pregnancy and Chlamydia. Average-looking people getting naked and risking embarrassment, especially if they read Cosmo and Maxim. Now, wait…relevance approaches.

Carla said the following on her blog.

You want people to see how easy it would be for them to wake up one morning and decide to give up their self-inflicted pain and enjoy their wonderful life. How easy it is to have a great day when you can make and eat your own toast, throw on your own clothes, go out into the world and do whatever you damn well feel like.”

Now that is the kind of wisdom that comes from dying. Yet it’s wisdom for living. How unfair. How tardy. What a waste of wisdom! George Bernard Shaw said, “Youth is wasted on the young.” Perhaps life is wasted on the living. It’s interesting how it is so hard for most of us to think of our mortality, which might knock some good perspective into place. Perhaps this denial is tragic. Perhaps it is a crucial part of our survival.

Now I’m not suggesting that on Valentine’s Day we should sip champagne and count all the ways we aren’t suffering. There is a time a place for that, for sure, but an expensive dinner without one’s unruly offspring is not one of them. “Honey, just think. We could be skeletons from 79 AD buried under Mt. Vesuvius.” “I know, sweetheart. I’m so glad I’m not covered in boils and writhing in pain only to be denied your final kiss before my death because you don’t want this Black Death thing I’ve got.” “Eating burgers on St. Valentine’s Day sucks, but at least none of our children are hemophiliacs.” We can, however, perhaps, if we think it’s a good idea, pause and reflect on what we can be thankful for. And what is wonderful about our Valentines: ”Ask not what your Valentine can do for you, but what you can do for your Valentine.” And then go screw Marilyn Monroe.

Rather than pine for my husband to offer me the right gesture or gift, and get mad when he doesn’t offer to reorganize the utilities closet (which has been trying to get his attention for about 2 years; unfortunately, my husband does not speak Closet and doesn’t hear when the out-of-place power drill cries for him in the night.), perhaps I can think about the hundreds of times he’s insisted on making me coffee. And the multiple hugs per day that he claims I used to demand of him before we had kids. (He has used this as a bargaining point in a fight: I gave you so many hugs.) Or how nice it is to just sit and talk with him and how much I miss him when he’s gone. The same is true for the little Valentines in my life. Rather than lament how hard it is to get them in bed, I could possibly choose to focus on their giggles and the multiple hugs times 3 children that have displaced the mandated deluge of hugs from their father.

This is item one on my gift-giving guide. Perhaps you’ve already mastered this, and I’ve bored you to tears, in which case you’re probably watching YouTube by now or checking your Farmville crops. But to those who are still here, I would like to HUMBLY suggest, since this is high on my To Do List, too, that you give your Valentine the gift of gratitude. Preemptively. Even before the tennis bracelet comes out of the box. And please don’t wear it in front of me. I’ll turn green with envy and start to hate my life.