On Being A Valentine

This is a repeat of a Valentine's Day column I wrote for the newspaper back in 2004. It seemed like a good time to repeat it here. Happy Valentine's Day, my beloved readers!

"You must love this time of year," people often say to me, "I'll bet you get tons of Valentine's!"

I inherited the name Valentine from my father along with my blue eyes and an inability to let anything drop.

"No," I tell them, "no more than anyone else."

"Still," I often hear, "it's such a romantic name. You must really love it."

Ah, well, yes, I do love it but as to romantic...

Romantic is a curious word. In this day of romance novels and ultra-aggressive commercialism, people have come to equate it with love and sentiments designed to manipulate the emotions - to appreciation if you are the receiver or to envy if you are not. But "romance" used to mean something quite different. My dictionary gives this definition: "A mysterious or fascinating quality or appeal, as of something adventurous, heroic or strangely beautiful." I love that!

For years I have believed that a romantic life is something we create day by day in our own unique ways. Somehow we have gotten the idea that we have to wait for the magical person who will transform us into handsome princes or beautiful princesses to have a romantic life but following the dictionary definition each of us possesses the possibility of filling our lives with romance every single day. I think it is about approaching your life as an exciting adventure, one holding new possibilities at every turn. I think it is about making a life instead of waiting for a life to happen.

Mythologist Joseph Campbell often wrote and spoke about "the hero's journey". He encouraged his students at Sarah Lawrence, and the thousands of people who read his books and watched his PBS series, to undertake the quest inward to get to know oneself. Inside each of us is an entire world of strangely beautiful possibilities.

I am always astonished at the creative ways people find to add lovely moments to their lives. In this age of utter exhaustion, when there is never enough time, it's a challenge to tuck moments of bliss in between taking care of kids, commuting, long hours at the job, family obligations, the endless lists of "shoulds" that crowd our lives. And yet so many people do.

I am a recent convert to the world of lovely teas. I always thought of tea as something for people with daintier tastebuds than mine. I was chatting online with my friend Paul who moved to Paris a few years ago and said I wished he could send me an afternoon in Paris, my life has been so demanding lately. A few weeks later a package arrived. In a beautiful black and gold pouch was a tea named "Afternoon in Paris". I brewed a pot and was swept away by the combined fragrance of sweet oranges, luxurious vanilla, and intoxicating roses. I fell in love.

Not all of us can be as daring as Paul who, following a bitter divorce, took a consolation trip to Paris and, after a week there, decided he wasn't coming back. He's lived there ever since. But I believe that we need dreams and we need to find small ways to approach those dreams. Books can take us there and music, hobbies and lovely teas or wines.

I read recently about a man who dreamed of a life as a writer. He set up a table in his basement next to the washing machine and every night found an hour or two to work on the novel he had been thinking about. When it was ready for publication he sent it out many times before it was bought by a small, low volume press that printed a short run and then failed to promote it. The writer, still believing in his dream, took what savings he had and bought a thousand copies from them. He spent weekends driving around setting up a little cardtable in front of Walmarts and trying to sell his book. He said some days not one person so much as looked at him. But eventually he sold the copies and started work on a second book which did much better. His name - of course you are dying to know this - is John Grisham. He was a man who believed in his dream and turned it into an adventure. A dream is a valentine from our soul.

When we take that heroic journey inward we embark on an adventure that lasts a lifetime. We discover that we are all amazing gifts waiting to be unwrapped and discovered. We are all Valentines.