Valentine’s Day Candy, Cards and Gifts

Every February since my husband died I buy myself a heart-shaped box of Whitman’s candy, the sampler sizes with three or six pieces inside. Why? I’m not really sure. Okay, that’s a little white lie. Early on into widowhood I decided if there’s no one else around to treat me, why not do it myself. I love me, right? No crime in that. I buy a long stemmed rose as well. It hardly seems possible that it’s been nine years since Don’s been gone, nine years of treating myself and one of the first posts in this blog explains how that tradition started…

2012: “My first Valentine’s Day without Don in 42 years is coming. Can you hear it marching towards me? Did you see all the red heart-shaped candy boxes on display in the stores or hear any radio advertisements to send your sweetheart flowers? I did, and I know from reading the writings of other widows online that this holiday is one of the most dreaded dates on the calendar, not just that first year after a spouse passes away but for many years to come.

“Today I came upon one of those candy displays and at first I was going to avoid walking by it. But from deep within I heard my inner voice saying: ‘Embrace the holiday. Embrace the memories that go with it.’ So I walked right up to the display and purposely let my tearing eyes linger over each square foot of the confection. The first thing I zeroed in on was a heart-shaped box with Snoopy on the front and he was holding his yellow bird, Woodstock. It was like a sign from Don. I never understood his love of Peanuts characters but in our early years together I’d gotten more than a few gifts featuring Snoopy and his feathery friend. That is until I said, ‘Enough already! Snoopy is your thing, not mine.’ In all the years we’d known each other he’d always had a Walt Schulz comic strip character somewhere in the house---on a watch, on coffee cups, on an article of clothing, etc. Snoopy even made it to Don’s memorial service compliments of a patch sewn on my husband’s t-shirt quilt that was displayed in the corner.”

After the Snoopy themed stuff got phased out of Don’s gift-giving repertoire, he started buying giant-sized Hallmark Valentine’s greeting cards that often came in their own boxes. They were lacy and sweet both in looks and flowery words. Since he knew his mom and I both had extensive collections of vintage Valentine’s Day cards Don was probably sure he’d picked a winning formula for making me happy on V-Day. He even got in the habit of signing his name on post-a-notes instead of writing inside those giant cards, the theory being they’d be worth more when we got old and gray and wanted to sell off my collection. Surprise, surprise. I got old and gray but the bottom fell out on the greeting card collecting hobby and last fall I sent all of those 8”x 10” Valentine’s to Goodwill with no regrets. I also had six-seven small heart-shaped candy boxes that, surprisingly, were harder to downsize out of my life than the greeting cards. I ended up keeping two that nested together so it looks like I’m half as sentimental as I am. They have Snoopy-themes and I keep them inside my TV cabinet where I see them often---actually just the one on the outside. They are a reminder that while the gifts we receive may not be the gifts we want, it's the spirit in which gifts are given that really counts. Snoopy brought joy to Don and he wanted to spread that joy around.

And that gift giving and receiving lesson is one I’m ashamed to admit I learned late in our relationship. Don tried hard but secretly I often wished he hadn’t spent the money the way he did. Like the time he bought me a large bottle of Joy perfume that sold for hundreds of dollars an ounce. (The real stuff, not the cologne.) My youngest niece had given me a point eight ounce bottle of it that her mother-in-law had brought back from Paris, but my niece didn’t like and I loved it, thus the re-gifting. I hoarded that bottle for special occasions, but when Don gave me the large bottle it didn’t feel special anymore. I would have been happier with another tiny bottle. At least I didn’t return it like the tiny diamond earrings a friend of mine got, then bought herself a pair of winter boots with the refund. Nor did I quit speaking to my husband like an old neighbor did when her husband gave her a vacuum cleaner for Valentine's Day. Ladies, do you think we send out mixed messages or are guys just bad at reading them?

I was hard to please but most of the time that was between me and myself and Don never knew when I was disappointed. And the pressure was on Don because my gifts to him were one-of-kind things that he absolutely loved. One year, for example, when I was into leather crafting I made him a tooled gun belt and holster that he used out West every year on his hunting trips and that I ended up selling on eBay after he died. Another year when I was taking a class on furniture building I made him a cherry box (to learn how to make tongue and groove joints) that held four cartons of cigarettes. He bragged that box up to an embarrassing level. Then a decade or so later the top started to warp and he asked me why it was doing that I and replied, “Poor workmanship” which made him laugh. God, I loved his laugh! It was deep and manly and if a laugh can be labeled sexy, it was that too. I still have that box and it looks goofy with its broken latch from trying to force it closed but for some reason I can’t seem to let it go… ©