8 years ago today, let’s just say I was far from myself. It was the first time in my life I ever felt alone, unwanted, unneeded, and unloved. 8 years ago today – it was the first time in 10 years I didn’t have a special guy in my life to celebrate Valentine’s Day with. Being the hopeless romantic that I was/am, this day meant a lot to me in more ways than one. If you knew my track record back in the day, Valentine’s Day was a big day for me. Always trying to top my surprises and presents year after year. But not that year. The few days leading up to Vday of 2004 was….let’s just say…a big giant pain in my neck (and my heart).
One of my best friends that was helping me through this difficult time in my life was leaving the day before Valentine’s Day to go to a business trip in Chicago so I didn’t have anyone to spend this horrid day with. So there I was – desperate, alone, and incredibly insecure. A few days before my friend’s flight, I was helping him pack for his trip and we had a conversation that changed my life forever…
Me: What the hell am I going to do without you for the next 4 days?! I’m going to be all alone!
Him: You’ll be fine – you’re such a drama queen!
What do you think of this shirt?
Me: Hmmm, yeah that’s cute. This tie would go nicely with it.
Who am I gonna hang out with?! The last thing I want is to be alone tomorrow..
Him: Why don’t you hang out with Charlie?
Me: That would be weird! We’ve never hung out alone before. I can just imagine the awkward silence.
Him: He’s cool, trust me. Just hit him up and see if he has any plans, maybe ‘the crew’ would want to hang out together.
Me: No, no, no. I’m too shy! F-it. I’ll just stay home…
The next day, I saw Charlie sign onto AIM. Yes, AOL Instant Messenger! We still use it to chat to this day. 🙂 I think I stared at his screen name for almost 30 minutes before I decided to message him lol! But I did. I summed up all my courage to double-click his name on my Buddy List and type “Hi” and I was absolutely terrified! After some small talk and a little inside joking, we decided to make plans for Valentine’s Day.
On Valentine’s Day, we got all our single friends together that wanted to go out and headed to BJ’s for dinner. That day, was our first date (we just didn’t think it was a date DATE at the time). I went to his house, we talked, and I told him about why I felt so sad on this day. He drove me to the restaurant and had a great time with the rest of our friends. At the end of the night, I wanted to ask him to be my Valentine, but I didn’t. I found out later in our relationship that he wanted to do the same, but didn’t end up asking me either. Ever since that day, we were inseparable. We hung out, talked, and just enjoyed each other’s company. A simple message turned into friendship, that turned into a crush, and then turned into love. A month and a half later he asked me to be his girlfriend and I said yes. The rest is history. 🙂
The thing I remember most about that day was the conversation we had that night. After telling him how alone and sad I felt on Valentine’s Day he said, “Who cares about Valentine’s Day. Nobody needs to tell you what day to love someone. Every day should be Valentine’s Day.” And every day we spent time together it has been. Charlie and I have never made a big deal out of this holiday because we don’t feel the need to and our feelings probably won’t change about it. But it was today that I realized that it actually does mean something to us after all.
