"Roses really smell like boo boo" aka "Where my teddy bear at?!"

Here I am sitting in my therapist's office waiting for our session to begin. Today is a day like any other except it's not. 

See tomorrow is Valentine's Day and while usually that means I have to repeatedly tell myself "I am beautiful. I am loved because I am love." And remind myself that "being alone doesn't mean I'm lonely" in the mirror as I get dressed for work. But this year....It's different because I'm actually in a relationship.

Not that I've never ever had a boyfriend during Valentine's Day and not that I've never gotten flowers or candy but I always felt that it was a bullshit holiday designed to divide us into two camps the haves and the have nots. 

It seems that the older I get the more hostile these factions become. Like this year is borderline on some Hunger Games shit. No lie...

But I digress...I honestly feel like I WANT to do the whole romantic comedy scavenger hunt where my lover has to traipse all over Boston to find the amazing gift that I've hidden for him. I want him to spread rose petals across my floor and have champagne. I even kinda want to be able to proclaim "He went to Jared!" as I saunter into work with the teeny tiny diamond earrings glinting in my ear lobes. 

I can't figure out why the hell this is happening!? I never hated Valentine's Day it just wasn't my thing. I guess you could say I've grown numb to it? But does this mean that I've grown numb to the idea of someone ever wanting to traipse around on my behalf? I don't think so.

 I've become the friend/daughter/co-worker who will say "Someone cared enough about you to get you flowers and send them to the office. A lot of people would like to get those flowers" not out of anger, jealousy or spite but out of the fact that we should never take for granted the things that our loved ones do for us...because it can be gone in a flash.

I've kissed enough frogs in my day. Had the gut wrenching heart aches and let downs. The highs the lows and everything in between. Maybe these experiences are what's been shaping my approach to other's seemingly ungrateful responses to their partners affections.

So here I am on this Valentine's Day eve in a brand new, healthy, supportive relationship.  Ever so deeply in with love with the most amazingly compassionate, loving man I've ever met. Wanting all the cheesy stuff that I've always looked at with a jaundiced eye. And for the life of me I can't figure out why it feels so different this year except maybe, just maybe, this year I am experiencing love in a completely new way. The way it is simply meant to be.