My Valentine's Day

Well, after roughly 27 Valentine's days spent as a single, history was made this year with the most wonderful Valentine's day I've experienced to date.

This wonderful Valentine's day started out with a very sweet text received on my phone at just around 12:00 AM as I was getting ready to crawl into bed. This was followed up with a date in the evening at Lee Arena watching the Washburn Ichabods play a great game of basketball where I tried to discreetly wear my not-so-discreet purple earbuds attached to my MP3/FM radio player so that I could listen to my favorite college team, Kansas State, play Kansas University. My wonderful friend, Casey, showed how wonderful he is in demonstrating great forbearance whenever I asked him to repeat what he had just said.

We finished up our romantic evening out with a dinner at Chili's where we sat in the sports bar watching the 2nd half of the K-State/KU game and munching on chips and queso. I quickly realized that I was the only K-State fan in the vicinity, so I had to exercise yet more discretion as I graciously toned down my elation at the favorable outcome of the basketball game.

I've always told myself (and I really do believe) that Valentine's day can often be what I call a "greeting-card" holiday. It can be a silly day where people who should be showing their love every day, assuage their guilty consciences by eating a candlelight dinner together and then slip back into their selfish ways for the next 364 days. It can be a silly day that makes all single people feel unnecessarily self-conscious and acutely alone as they watch bouquets of flowers appear on their coworkers' desks and listen to them talk about their dinner plans. I've never been a big fan of Valentine's day, but I'll just say that having someone to share it with, no matter what you do to celebrate, is really something worth celebrating. And if your favorite team happens to beat the #1 ranked team on Valentine's day, that, too, is worth celebrating.

All in all, it was a truly wonderful Valentine's day. Not wonderful because of any grandiose deliveries or dinners, not even because of a grandiose display of athletic prowess by Jacob Pullen. It was wonderful simply because there was someone to share it with...and that is something that can and should be celebrated every day.