Heart Strings

I spent a lot of time when I was growing up identifying with Charlie Brown. I had a big round head, and I was prone to fits of precocious depression. I had a dog - a dachshund, not a beagle. I carried a torch for a cute little brunette haired girl, not a red-head. I spent a lot of time staring at the mailbox on Valentine's Day - waiting, hoping.
Fast forward to my well-adjusted middle age, and I find myself still having Brownian pangs as the pink and red hearts start to float around. I watch the kids in my class attempt to negotiate the terrifying transition between "friends," "just good friends," and "boyfriend/girlfriend." Who do you give a Valentine to? Mister Caven insists that anyone who brings a card for someone in class has to bring one for everyone in the class. I have mentioned, as an aside, that if they would like to give a special card to someone, then they may do that after school. That kind of cootie-inducing activity can't take place on school grounds, sorry.
Now I recall all the years I spent pooh-poohing the idea of Valentine's Day. I had a standing date with a couple of other friends, who happened to be girls, and we all agreed that if we ever found Mister and Missus Right, we'd introduce them so they could get married. Turns out that now I'm married to one of them, so I have all kinds of heart-shaped ambivalence about the holiday. The cynic in me says that most of those chocolates could be put to better use on the depressed folks who don't have a "Valentine" and all those flowers are compost in a week anyway. The happily married guy understands that this is yet another opportunity to remind the woman I love that she is unique in all the world, and if she would do me the favor of being mine I would be endlessly pleased.
I hope you all have someone to get a Valentine from, even if they did have to give one to everyone else in the class.