Exploring Romance
Valentine’s Day.
Makes me think of heart-shaped candies, chocolates, and lace-fringed paper in shades of pink. In theory, it sounds like a fine holiday… a recognition of love. What could be wrong with that?
But, in my formative years, Valentine’s Day always felt like a test. It was the day when everyone was supposed to reveal who they liked, and you had to be creative about it. Cards, candy, special words, surprises… no pressure.
It not only felt like a test, but—to me—something felt off-putting. An awkward sense of excitement and disappointment. It was so cliché. Embarrassing. As I matured, the unsaid motive of society’s “holiday” became all too obvious. It was about sales. It put you on the never-ending quest to purchase the perfect gift: cards, perfume, flowers, jewelry, you name it. Our society had commercialized love as a way to sell generic stuff. And we were buying it.
And poof. There went any magic that might have once surrounded Valentine’s Day.
Why Valentine’s Day? Did marketing genius create the hype? Picture the Mad Men in a dimly lit room delighting over the plastic stuff they could sell if they twisted the concept of love just far enough. But they didn’t do that, did they? Maybe.
My quick Google search about the history of Valentine’s Day led me to the ancient Romans. Three priests, all with the name Valentine, were executed on February 14 of different years. Evidently, one of these priests was martyred because he disobeyed a Roman law that forbade young men to marry because they made better soldiers when single. He married the couples anyway… in secret.
Then there was the ancient feast of Lupercalia, which was celebrated religiously by the Romans mid-February of every year. This celebration included blood sacrifices of goats and dogs, whose hides were used to whip women to bolsters fertility. Then the young men drew names of women from a jar for a (wink, wink) match. So romantic.
Between bites of chocolate, I could have bashed Valentine’s Day forever.
That is, until I encountered a narrative-changing day in 2019. Oh, the irony.
February 14, 2019—for me—was the day love became glaringly real and more precious than ever. It was the day my husband Chris took me on the ride of a lifetime. It was the day he was diagnosed with Guillain-Barre Syndrome.
Guillain-Barre Syndrome is a rare autoimmune response typically triggered by a common virus or bacteria. It causes the body’s immune system to attack itself by mistake, instead of the intended target. Chris’ case was so severe that he became a quadriplegic on a ventilator in a matter of days. He was so debilitated that, eventually, he even lost the ability to blink. His eyes snapped wide open, so we had to tape them shut for months.
Ever the romantic, Chris swept me off my feet on Valentine’s Day 2019. He invited me to sail the sky in a life-flight chartered for two, just hours after his diagnosis. It was a surprise adventure. We were going to the hospital three hours away, but our actual destination was unknown. Where were we headed and what would become of us? I wondered.
And just like that, we unwittingly said good-bye to the life we’d lived. The life where we were blissfully ignorant of being anything but healthy. The life where we felt weary from waking up in the middle of the night to one of our four children’s calls for assistance or—better yet—snuggles. We missed the little voices that filled the house with shrieks of laughter. We grieved the sweet nothings of our baby girl and the missed “firsts” that we’d never get back.
The gift of this diagnosis (and everything that came with it) was far from the generic promise of Valentine’s Day.
So, what is romance, really? The dictionary defines it as:
// a quality or feeling of mystery, excitement, and remoteness from everyday life.
I thought back to 2019. Throughout Chris’ traumatic illness, we grieved the life we’d lived. But we also saw things previously invisible to our view: the way we had grown into each other, leaned on, and advocated for the other. We saw everyone in our lives become exceedingly nimble to our needs, willing to do whatever needed to be done. We found new ways to connect with our children. We felt our families and community radiate their love in the most beautiful of ways.
Our experience spoke of the power and promise of love, even in the ups and downs. The love of a husband and wife; the love of parents and their children; the love of family, friends, and community; the love of the Beloved and the love of the human Spirit.
Yes, it was painful, but perhaps Valentine’s Day 2019 was the most romantic day I had ever experienced.
It was raw and unexpected. It removed us from everyday life. It launched an emotional journey with those I love. It was horrible and mysterious. And it broke me open.
It created in me a deeper capacity for love.