admin, Author at Mothering in the Middle

Valentine’s Day: The Power of the Minority Can Help the Majority (An Open Letter to Speaker John Boehner)

by Cyma Shapiro

Dear Speaker Boehner:

I recently saw your interview on “60 Minutes,” and was left with the feeling that I have work to do on your behalf. In past years, I’ve written Valentine’s Day posts on “The Power of One Helps Make a Whole” and “The Power of One: Honoring Yourself.”

This year, during Valentine’s Day, I will take this a step further to embrace you with open arms while trying to sort out your methodologies and approach. I’ll call it “The Power of the Minority Can Help the Majority.” I am not discussing politics, Mr. Speaker.

I find it hard to believe that anyone with goodness in their heart can support policies which will hurt the majority of others, especially the downtrodden. I’m writing to appeal to your better nature and your heart. […]

The Power of One – A Gift to Yourself

by Cyma Shapiro

Two year’s ago, in my Huffington Post Valentine’s Day essay, “The Power of One,” I wrote about how important Valentine’s Day is and how I start thinking about the upcoming holiday soon after the last holiday ends! I explained how I spend several months formulating who I’ll send cards to and who I’ll call/see/meet simply to say “I love you” and express my thanks and gratitude for being in my life.

How, in the weeks leading up to it, I’ll buy V-Day boxer shorts (once cotton, now solid silk) for my now fully-grown stepchildren (and their partners); the largest Reese’s chocolate heart I can find and heart pajamas for my husband; a heart necklace and/or bracelet for my young daughter and the proverbial stuffed animal with heart for my rapidly growing elementary school son (who, at this point, is finding this very unsettling). […]

Valentine’s Day: The Power of One Helps Make a Whole

by Cyma Shapiro

Valentine’s Day 2014

It’s hard to explain my (utter) fascination with Valentine’s Day. On the therapist’s couch, this near-obsession has been explained away as a move to fill an unfilled heart, a response to a loveless childhood and a push to find my own heart — all true, but not a fully convincing argument for those accustomed to my ongoing madness.

Each year, I ruminate about the next holiday… well… after the holiday ends. Like my young daughter’s obsession with her next birthday, I begin formulating how I’ll spend the day, who I’ll send cards to and who I’ll call/see/meet to say “I love you” and express my thanks.

In the weeks leading up to it, I’ll buy V-Day boxer shorts (once cotton, now solid silk) for my now fully-grown stepchildren; the largest Reese’s chocolate heart I can find and heart pajamas for my husband; a heart necklace and/or bracelet for my young daughter and the proverbial stuffed animal with heart for my rapidly growing elementary school son (who, at this point, is finding this a bit unsettling). […]

A Family Valentine’s Day

by Melanie Elliott

I’m kind of one of those people who consider Valentine’s Day a Hallmark-created holiday. Growing up, I tried not to buy into the importance of the day and the romantic notions that permeate this holiday. I wasn’t quite successful.

There was a part of me that longed for the flowers and chocolates and the boyfriend who’d treat me like a queen on this special day. But, that was only a part of me. The other part of me didn’t want to be defined by whom I was with or how I was treated when February 14 rolled around.

[…]

Valentine’s Day History: The Mother of the American Valentine

Artist Esther Howland (1828–1904) was the first to publish and sell Valentine cards in the United States. Before Esther, many Valentine cards were hand made with paper, lace, and ribbons and handwritten poetry. By the end of the 19th century, most Valentines were mass-produced by machine, many based on Esther’s designs.

The Howland Family operated the largest book and stationery store in Worcester, Massachusetts. As a young student at The Mount Holyoke Female Seminary, Class of 1847, and a contemporary of the poet Emily Dickinson, Esther had been exposed to the annual Valentine celebrations. After graduating at the age of nineteen, she received an intricate English Valentine from one of her fathers’ business acquaintances. She was sure that she was capable of making similar or even better ones.

Persuading her father to order lace paper and other supplies from England and NYC and, with determination, she made a dozen valentine’s samples, which her brother added to his catalog for his next sales trip. Hoping for as much as $200 in orders, they were shocked when her brother returned with more than $5,000 in advance sales, more than she could make herself. Faced with the huge order, she asked her three best friends to help her. A Valentine assembly line was born at the Howland home. In 1879, The New England Valentine Company was born.

Esther is credited with several innovations in valentine design: the small brightly colored wafer of paper placed to give contrast under the white paper lace; and the built-up shadow box that became popular in the latter part of her career. While not the only Valentine’s Day card shop, Howland’s became the […]

Repercussions of a Greeting Card Holiday

by Randi Hoffman

Valentine’s Day falls in the dead of winter, and this has been one of the coldest, snowiest and wettest. Romantically, I can imagine a roaring fireplace in an isolated cabin, some brandy, no children, reading Marguerite Duras’ The Lover to each other. But I am lucky if I get some cheap chocolates and flowers from the East Village Key Food.

It is a holiday of disappointment, even if I know in the back of my head that my expectations are unrealistic. […]

The Heart’s Memory Lives On

by Lori Pelikan Strobel

On my kitchen counter there sits a small basket. In the basket, there is a small, folded-up piece of notebook paper. I have kept this note for 36 years. It is yellowed and slightly torn at the corners, but I haven’t been able to throw it out. It has a very special Valentine’s Day message to me.

I remember the grade school days of giving Valentine’s Day cards to all of my classmates. My mother would drive me to the store and I would painstakingly pick out the perfect box of Valentine’s Day cards for my friends. After handing them out in class, I can clearly see myself breathlessly waiting to open the cards from my friends, especially the boys. Somehow my girlfriends and I could always figure out which boy liked us. […]

Skipping Valentine’s Day Forever (A Love Story)

by Nicholas D'Ambra

When I was little, my Dad would come home every Valentine’s Day with his arms over flowing with sweets and treats from our local Douglas Drug store. I can imagine him standing in a long line with other men who were last minute shopping.

My Dad wasn’t a last minute shopper, this was just how he did it, every single year. The gifts he carried weren’t just for my Mom, but for me and my sister as well. There were always chocolates for us and sometimes a toy or stuffed animal. My mom annually received a large heart-shaped box of chocolates and roses.

Years later, I carried on with the tradition. I bought similar gifts for that special person I was dating. I also purchased various chocolates and heart shaped items for my single friends so they wouldn’t feel left out. Then, when I met my husband-to-be, it all changed. Valentine’s Day was no longer that special day to espouse love and present gifts. It was just another day, no special than any other. It saddened me to think it was over. […]

Cupid’s Dilemma (A Cynical Look at Valentine’s Day, With Some Statistics, Too)

by Nancy LaMar-Rodgers

Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre

Ok so it’s not that dramatic but let’s face it, Valentine’s Day is a pressure cooker. My single friends loathe it because it reminds them they are single. My newly divorced friends hate it because it makes them feel like failures and, quite frankly, my few happily married friends also detest it, because of the pressure of reminding each other “how much you really mean to me.”

Let’s face it, if you are still married after 20 years in this day and age, it’s a miracle unto itself and for me, I love nothing better than my husband doing the laundry and dishes, and for him I am sure my showing of love on that day comes in the form of less flannel and more stockings and heels. […]

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Valentines Schmalentines

Commentary, Daily Living, Midlife Foibles!, Motherhood, Mothers Over 40

Valentines Schmalentines

by Jo-Ann Rogan

Valentine’s Day is a waste of time and I tend not to celebrate it in any meaningful way. I don’t require my husband to bring me gifts or take me out for dinner. Valentine’s Day is about a month and a half from Christmas and exactly a month before our wedding anniversary. We can celebrate love any other time of the year and we won’t have to fight a crowd. We might say “Happy Valentine’s Day” and hug, but the celebration ends there. Usually, for my kids, I plan an experience in the time around Valentine’s Day, like a trip to the indoor water park or another fun event.

I don’t need a holiday for my husband to show me he loves me. He does that when he makes me a cocktail with fresh squeezed juice on Saturday nights after I have served drinks to half of the city for two nights in a row. I feel the love when we stand in the kitchen supposedly cooking but instead we are watching a TV show on the kitchen computer, and he starts to rub my back. […]

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