And I’ve literally been single my entire life
On February 14th, everyone knows love is in the air. Cupid takes out his bow and arrow and possesses everyone on God’s green earth to post their significant other on their Instagram story (I was one of the few who was not possessed to do so). And yes, I can completely understand how this can feel overwhelming to open your phone and feel like everyone spawned a significant other; I definitely felt this way too. But it’s important to remember there is so much more to love than just romantic love.
Love comes in many different forms. The textbook definition of love is literally just “an intense feeling of deep affection.” It’s important to remember that nowhere in that definition does that imply romantic love. I love my family, my friends, my dogs, my school, the opportunities I have access to, and brown sugar shaken espressos. This is just a short list of things which I genuinely feel that I love. It can be difficult, but we need to remind ourselves that these feelings of love can be so prevalent.
So when I say I love Valentine’s Day, it is because love is in the air. Love for all the things around us. Which is why I, someone who is violently single, love Valentine’s Day.
This past Valentine’s Day, for me, started bright and early with an 8:50 lecture, in which my professor opened by talking about how much he loved teaching. He talked about how it made him feel important giving us more tools to navigate the world around us and how much he appreciated getting to know the students in his classroom. He spoke about how much he has grown to love understanding how what we can learn in a classroom can impact our lives, and how much he loved being a part of that. This reminder helped me to appreciate how versatile love really is, because there are so many different things to love.
I don’t want to discount how Valentine’s Day can be a difficult day for so many. But I think it is important to acknowledge how this day can be celebrated with all types of love. Not just the ones that are most frequently posted about on social media, although it’s important to celebrate that love as well. But, as someone whose Valentine was their mother for the eighteenth year in a row, I can say Valentine’s Day is so much more than a day just for people in a relationship. It’s a day to appreciate all the things we feel this deep affection towards, and I think we can find how much of that is a part of our lives in a variety of ways. In the least cheesy way possible, Valentine’s Day is just about the love that does exist all around us.