Valentine’s Day
My strongest Valentine’s Day memory is from the first grade in 1953. We lived in Oceanside California. My father was stationed at Camp Pendleton. My grandfather back in Texas had just died on the 11th. We were going home to bury him. I had a little box full of valentine cards for my classmates. I took it to a neighbor friend to take to school for me because we were heading back to Texas. Here’s the memory. When I told the neighbor why I couldn’t be in school to pass out the cards, I started crying and ran home.
Oddly enough, the house where we gathered as we prepared to bury my grandfather stood right next to the house where I now live. The old house is gone, replaced by a new house. But I still remember the front room and the fireplace and being there with a cousin who was charged with babysitting me and my younger brother, who was four at the time. I remember nothing else about the trip. Not my grandmother’s house in San Antonio nor the ride to get there, which must have taken some time back in those days.
I guess we remember what we need and that was my first lesson in grief and how to manage it. And now here I am. This is the fourth Valentine’s Day since the death of my wife. She loved the cards and little gifts, and I always had them ready for her in the morning because doing it later in the day made it feel as though I’d forgotten, and I didn’t want her to think that. And this feels like a bit of a downer for such a romantic day, but that’s what popped up and grief is just something you learn to live with because it’s part of life.