My Eternal Valentine

"When two hearts race, both win."

It was five years ago, Valentine's Day 2003, that we became engaged. Andrew had done an extremely good job at downplaying Valentine's day all together. He said it was a 'forced' holiday and really wasn't all that romantic considering that the whole point behind the holiday is having someone dictate a day for people to be romantic. I was a little bummed and not expecting much. After getting out of class mid-afternoon he picked me up and blindfolded me where he proceeded to drive me to an unknown, mystery place. Still blindfolded I was led through an outdoorsy type of place, walking through snow where we stopped in a glen of trees. Here he took the blindfold off to reveal balloons tied all over the trees forming a frame around us. He then handed me a gift bag with a CD and perfume. For a moment I thought he would have pulled out a ring, and quite honestly, when I was handed the gift bag I was a little disappointed. But still giving him props for being romantic on a holiday in which he wasn't too hip about, I racked it up as being extremely thoughtful and was excited that he'd atleast done something.


But then he told me we couldn't leave the balloons there so we'd need to cut them all down and let them go. He gathered the dozen balloons or so and led me through the little forested area and onto the 'green' of the fifth hole at the Logan golf course. Only the green was white with untainted snow where he had imprinted a huge heart with his footsteps and filled with rose petals. As we stood in the middle of the giant heart, he let the balloons go one at a time and said something he loved about me with each one. On the last one, he knelt down and pulled out the box, the question was asked, and I was actually too in shock to answer right away. He had done such a good job in making me believe that it wasn't going to happen that day and had even sidetracked me with the whole gift bag. But, he repeated the question, and the rest is history.


I thought the pictures we took that day were lost on our old digital camera's harddrive. I was never able to figure out how to get them off before it broke, but then after publishing this post my sweet mother-in-law, Karen, e-mailed me this pix that she said she found on a CD along with our other engagement pictures. That made my valentine's day...almost as good a gift as the one five years ago :o) (*aside*; And perhaps I was inspired to post this story without realizing it. I don't know if there ever would have been another occasion in which Karen would have known I didn't have the pictures, and I have just assumed all was lost. What a precious gift!

So this Valentine's day, five years later, I look back with a grateful heart for a man who managed to surprise me all the same. Valentines days are not quite like that anymore, but I love him even more. Thanks for being my eternal Valentine, Babe! I love you always and all ways!