St. Valentine's Day porker...

The porker in question

Maybe you've gotten used to my snarky ways. Maybe you were thinking this whole post would be an ill-tempered screed against Valentine's Day. Maybe you were hotly anticipating some mean-ass prose, decrying the corruption of love.

And just maybe you were wrong.

Actually, Valentine's Day is one of my favorite holidays, even though its origins go back only to the 19th c., the industrial revolution, and the sugar-coating of nearly every aspect of our culture (kids, pets, death, marriage, love, war, prison etc). Also forget every "historical" (aka religious) explanation of some fabled St. Valentine. It's a sketchy notion at best. Until 1964, the Catholic church acknowledged eleven St. Valentine's saints' days, all of them suspect, and none of them having squat to do with romance.

Never mind. I think you've gotta love any holiday commemorating the mysteries of the heart, even if it's sometimes celebrated in weird, creepy ways. God knows, we do our best. I've just gotten back from Walgreen's Drug Store. I mostly went just to get cigarettes and a new lipstick. Once there I was confounded by the sight of bewildered men thumbing through cards and hefting candy boxes. "Yeah," my husband said, when I reported back, "it's the one holiday you gotta sweat."

When Valentine's Day fell on a work day, I was often in Albertson's supermarket around 6 PM. Not wanting to miss a lick or a dollar, Albertson's goes for Valentine's big time. This year they've dedicated two full store-length aisles to crap of all things Valentine's: teddy bears, heart-shaped things, candy, mylar balloons et. al. It only shows how ignorant a soulless corporation can be. Men always put off doing anything about Valentine's until the very last possible minute, when everything is limp, grimy, and nothing you'd give to anyone. Back then, I was often waylaid by some frightened guy holding a wilted plant, wanting to know, "Is this is okay?"

Well, obviously not.

Since we were already in a supermarket, I'd suggest, "How 'bout a nice brisket?" Something I knew I'd like.

But then, I'm not a romantic.

A valentine in questionable taste any time at all

Mysteries....

A new anthology from The Sun

Even if I didn't have a piece in this, I'd buy it because I know what kind of stuff The Sun publishes. Their contributors write pieces that gallop, trot, or stroll without popular niceties or literary self-consciousness. If there's a unifying style, it comes in the form of actual speech, spoken in the untidy middle of life itself. This makes for startling admissions, blurted secrets, and the relief of recognition.

I haven't read this anthology yet. Hell, I haven't even read my own piece since I published it. I have to give The Sun a lot of credit for using this title: The Mysterious Life of the Heart. Normally, a title like that would send me running for the nearest graphic novel, just to get the taste out of my mouth. The title alone would clue me into the contents: chickish lit, sad break-up stories, and lotsa angst all around. But given that it's The Sun, all bets are off about what's inside. I feel almost tingly about getting my copy, knowing I'll come away with some real answers about the heart and its mysteries. Because what else is there beyond our longings, passions, and loves and what they weave together? Not much.

In some way, every story is a love story.

And sometimes an old friend will save your ass...

The Mad Hatter's Teaparty
Illus. by John Tenniel

On my blog, there's a postage-stamp sized image just below the section labeled About Me. It's the cover of an anthology I'm in, concerning the mysteries of the heart. My piece is about a time in my life marked by a recognition of raw facts, suddenly made crystalline and unavoidable. It was a time when I knew I had to leave my husband, and quickly too. The only mystery of the heart was why I'd stayed so long.

That I would leave was already a fact, settled stone-like in my mind. I'd dispensed with tormenting myself over my marriage's failure, my husband's opacity, and our inability to talk. Whether I'd tried hard enough, been unkind, had loved or not loved, none of it mattered. In truth, I was probably walking out on a big damned mess, much of it of my own making, but I didn't care. I'd absorbed one great lesson from David: I could just go.

I don't remember talking to David about leaving or divorcing, although perhaps I did. He wasn't uncomfortable with conversations like that, and later, more than once, I'd soak down his shirt, weeping idiotically over one boyfriend or another. But during my separation and subsequent divorce, I was suddenly too deep in real-life dilemmas to philosophize about whatever emotions I had or didn't have.

I had never lived alone, I had never managed my own money, I had never paid a bill, had never had a checking account, and my list of nevers seemed to run on without end. I was stuck in a small square brick house on a deer lease, several miles from Iowa City and away from anyone I knew. And, as we divied up our belongings, my-then husband and I, what I mostly thought about was the stuff we'd accrued. I wondered what I'd do with my half of the stuff, how I'd get the stuff to wherever I was going, and whether I'd have room to store my stuff.

In my memory, I can see myself sitting on the living room floor, piling stuff into a collection of liquor boxes I'd scrounged. Surely there were days between that night and the morning I recall most clearly, but there's only a blank spot. What I know next is that it was suddenly Saturday morning, the sun was shining, and David showed up with a truck, looking cheerful. In a matter of minutes, he had me packed up, settled into the truck cab, and we drove away. Much later, I wrote of that moment, And I left my husband forever, and that's true too.

Had he not shown up, I imagine I would have gotten through the hassle of moving somehow. But I don't think the day would have bloomed so brightly.

As he often did, David made the day worth celebrating.

As it surely was.