Long Lost Valentine

It was homemade.  And yet it wasn't made of cut out hearts and paper doilies.  It was a two-fold computer printout card that didn't cost a dime.  That's because we didn't have a dime.

It is one of my most treasured possessions.  The value doesn't lie in its beauty.  The value doesn't lie in its clever design nor the time and effort required to make it.

This Valentine card, with its stains and faded ink, holds value because of the message scribbled by a man who hates to write, who questions his eloquence, who becomes paralyzed by holding a pencil.

I'll let you be the judge.

Dear Ardith,

I hope this card makes up for all of the neglect and disappointments that a mother of three preschoolers has to put up with,

certainly it should come close.

I know that it may seem that our relationship has, metaphorically speaking, dry docked off the sea of romance.

But after further reflection and thoughtful overview, I come to realize that we are not dry docked on a desert isle where love is not felt.

But we simply have arrived where all true loves belong, and that's in a family that deeply cares for each other and whose entire existence depends on each other.

You see, before we only had the romantic side of each other.

But now we have the hope, the trust, and the covenant promise of love forever.

And though at times we seem to have lost a few happy moments of romance,

I know that I have gained far much more.

Love, BJH

P.S. I amour' you, you hunk of woman you!!!!

As I sit here, mopping up the tears, I realize that love just keeps getting better and better.  We may have lost the kick in our step and the figures and the faces of youth, but what has survived the test of time is a deep abiding devotion.  We not only love one another, we take care of one another. We place the other's needs before our own; we finish the other's sentences; we step in immediately to pick up after the other's shortcomings.

I need you.  And I'm pretty sure you need me.

Could there be any truer valentines?