Valentine's Day and Beyond................

A warm smile, a firm hand

Careless whispers that never end

The weekend plans, the movie waits

Sometimes a small tiff or a little irate

Sometimes it’s made for each other

Sometimes it’s mismatched

Call it love, infatuation, or just a passing phase

Love is in the air or is it just a haze

Valentine’s Day.....is it for real or is it hype, some swear by it while others abhor it, for some it is the day they have been waiting for to share a special feeling, while for others, it’s just Archie’s’ way of making more money.

Maybe I am outdated or old fashioned for this young generation, but I believe in Love. Love is special, love is waiting for that special someone to come and sweep you off your feet, love is sharing, caring, understanding, and adjusting. Yes, a lot of the younger ones may feel otherwise, but as I mentioned earlier, I am old fashioned when it comes to love.

It takes a lot of strength to walk up to someone and say ‘I Love you’. There are people who spend days, months and sometimes years to say it to their someone special, but then if you really love the person, just walk up and say it, coz, life doesn't give you too many chances.

Ours was a love story with a difference, a little old fashioned, a little strange but it was love nonetheless. We met as classmates for the first time during our college orientation and the fact that we both belonged to same city, brought us closer. Somewhere in the four years of college, we realised that we liked each other but that was that. We did not talk about it and it only gave our friends a reason to have a good time making fun of the situation that we were in. Four years passed and it was the last day.....the next day we would return and we knew that probably we would not get to see each other ever again....it was our last chance, we met for one last time ‘as friends’, said our goodbyes, yet we chose not to speak about it and walked away with heavy hearts. It was probably a very difficult situation to be in, to act normal and yet knowing that there was so much pain inside. After three years, we met again, and no, this too wouldn't have been possible, had luck not been on our side, but we were given a second chance, and this time, we both somehow knew, there would be no more chances.  So we met, looked at each other, held hands and decided to get married and today fourteen years later, aren’t we glad! Unlike other love stories, our love story was different; there were no dates, no candlelit dinners, no huge Valentine’s Day celebrations, yet we were there for each other, he in one city and I in another, till we got married. We moved into this cute little home of ours that we worked hard to set up.  We discovered little things about each other along the way. He helped me become a more confident person, gave wings to my dreams, and encouraged me to outdo my fears.  We stood alongside each other, helping each other achieve our dreams.

Today as I watch him working away on his laptop, a person, who I first met as a friend twenty two years ago and today as my husband, a person who is the way he is, no pretences, very caring, very special. No he is not the mushy, holding hands and saying ‘I Love you’ twenty times a day kinds, but I see his Love when I see him concerned when I am a li’l upset or the time when he sits by me listening patiently to all the jabbering I do, or quietly eating a new recipe which might have turned out wrong and just say, may be next time it will be better, or the time when I am sick and he wakes up multiple times at night just to check if I am fine. I see his Love when he is upset with me for not giving it back to someone who might have hurt me, or the fact that he has started liking dogs because I like them.

All this would not have been possible had we chosen to keep quiet. The regret would have pricked us all our lives. Maybe we would have married different people, but I guess it wouldn't have been the same.

So all you people out there who are in love but haven’t told your someone special about it, go ahead and say it.....that someone might just be waiting for you. You may brighten up someone’s day or someone’s life and yours’.

 But remember love is beyond dating and talking endlessly on the phone, or movies and parties, it is standing by each other and for each other at all times, it is knowing the flaws in the other person yet letting them be overshadowed by all their goodness. Love is not having too many expectations and walking away when they are not met, but love is dreaming together, and being together in the journey of achieving that dream, some dreams come true and some come half way to being true, but it’s the journey that makes the difference.

When you truly, madly and deeply fall in Love with a person, nothing else matters.  For all you people who are or have been in Love, you know what I mean.........so while Valentine’s day may be a gimmick for some, it still give us a chance to step back and Thank that someone who has made our life special, or a chance to make someone’s life special by letting them know how much they mean to us.

Call it a Valentine’s Day or any other day, but just remember that we have been lucky to have certain people in our lives who love us and care for us. Let’s not take them for granted, coz who knows what happens tomorrow.....it might be just a li’l too late!!

Happy Valentine’s Day people.......go out and spread the happiness...Someone Somewhere cares for you and it’s time to let them know that it matters to you.