When it comes to Valentine’s Day, too often we spend the days leading up focusing on the people we desire. Boys, girls, crushes, hook-ups… you name it, but either way we usually end up leaving out a sacred group of people in our lives: our gal pals, our best friends, our sisters.
Annually, Valentine’s Day is looked at as one of those magical days on the calendar when the stars are supposed to align and our infatuation ultimately becomes reciprocated. I’m guilty of this fixation — Hollywood has certainly managed to encourage my dreams of affection. But this year, I’ve found myself so grateful for the bonds of sisterhood. The ritual of well-kept secrets, the moments where I’d rather be crying but instead I’m laughing and the support that I couldn’t imagine being without. Perhaps Charlotte York said it best: “Maybe we could be each other’s soulmates. And then we could let men be just these great nice guys to have fun with.”
Wouldn’t it be great to have a soulmate that happens to be your spouse one day? I mean that’s the dialogue that everyone seems to blindly accept; after all, it’s been thrown at us from day one in nearly every variation of literature. Still, the older I get, and with each different relationship I experience, I no longer buy into this perception of a soulmate. I hope and aspire to meet someone who knows me better than I know myself and can fill an emotional and physical void in the way only a lover could. But take away the need of the status quo duality of best friend and lover, and realize we’re not missing as much as we believe. The wonderful women in your life who know what you did last night just by the look on your face, the ladies who surprise you with random acts of kindness, the best friend that will hold you when you’re crying at 2am; these are the moments that we are guilty of letting go by as less than they are.
So this year, I feel that I’ve grown somehow. I feel secure in knowing that I’m not waiting on a soulmate. Instead, I have soulmates. There will be plenty of time to worry about who I’ll be spending my February 14th in the years to come, but this year and for the next few years, I’m looking forward to embracing a different kind of love, the kind that is best spent with wine and a Nicholas Sparks movie — no boys allowed.