I had writer’s block the night before Valentine’s. I couldn’t even begin writing a card. I couldn’t write anything. And then I thought, I’ll blog about how I can’t write and then maybe I’ll be able to write, and it was the saddest fucking idea ever. So I went on not writing. All Monday and Monday night. I woke at 5 a.m. Tuesday morning, and expected to be able to write something. Nope.
Fuck you, heart! Fuck you, brain! Letting a girl down. Lazy bastards.
Later I was sitting in the car, thinking about how the morning had been. How Gavin had run into the bedroom and we’d said “Happy Valentine’s Day! Have you seen your present?” (The present I bought a week earlier, and had in my bag all day Monday and still kept secret. See. Anyone can change.) And he found it on the wheelie chair: the Hello Kitty Yellow Dragon and the Valentine card Mary had made for him while I fell asleep.
He was silent for a long time. And then, he breathed, “Pikachu.” And I thought maybe he was confused about the yellow dragon, but he meant the Valentine. And he exclaimed, “Oh, I love them. Thank you for my presents! Let’s nail my Valentine to the wall, like a poster.” And he carried the Hello Dragon tucked under his arm like a football, and we nailed the Valentine on his wall, and he kept saying, “Pikachu says, ‘Happy Valentine’s Day, Gavin.'” The little Pokemon’s dimples were red hearts.
And finally, sitting in the car, I wrote my card, and felt pretty good about it, until I got Mary’s. 100 reasons I want to marry you again. She asked me to read it to her after I put the kid to bed. I don’t know why I balked. But it seemed mean not to read it, so finally I did. I made it to number 11 before I started sobbing. Sometimes you’re just supposed to feel things. You’re the witness, not the reporter. And you just feel. And that’s a story, too.
