February 9, 2000

Valentine's Day: Cure for lovesickness

By GARRETT LEIVA
Herald editor
       Money might not buy happiness, but this time of year you can find love for a mere $3.95 plus tax.
      Valentine's Day is a holiday synonymous with greeting cards. For many, February 14 means expressing the innermost yearnings of their soul with words such as 'doth,' 'twane' and 'thou' in iambic pentameter. Others draw a heart and sign their name on the opposite side of the UPC code.
      Every year would-be Romeos and Juliets search the racks at the greeting card shop, grocery store or 24-hour gas station for just the right words. Some choose a love that flies on gossamer wings. Others opt for a more pithencanthropine approach with the 'gee honey, I know I yell at the football game and drink too much beer, but I love ya' babe' card. Then there are those that buy cards with words inside that rhyme with nicer.
      When it came to Valentine's Day, however, nothing said 'I like you a lot' to a fourth-grader better than a 25 pack of tiny cards. Cartoon super heroes, zoo animals, Barbie and Ken, they were all stuffed into the top slot of decorated shoeboxes on Valentine's Day. Along with pink frosting cupcakes, 'Be Mine' candy hearts and sugar-free Kool-Aid, these wallet-size Valentine cards were an elementary school tradition.
      Unlike the homework on big line paper crumpled at the bottom of your locker, selecting the right Valentine's Day card was an assignment not taken lightly. After all, should the sole 'Bee Mine' Valentine go to Jennifer or Amy? Would 'No Lion, Your My Valentine' give Tammy mixed messages? Perhaps Billy would think 'Joe Cool' was lame. All this while agonizing over which of your 15 signatures you should use next to 'Remember Me Always' and 'True Friends Forever.'
      Trite as it sounds today, passing out a Valentine card with a certain four-letter word could spell playground grief. Suddenly you and Karen go from sitting next to each other in class to sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G. Before you know it, first comes love, second comes marriage, then comes a baby in a baby carriage. Finally - under the duress of all that sing-song taunting - you stick out your tongue, call girls "gross" and do the only manly thing: run away.
      Now up until fourth-grade, I never had to face this scenario since my feelings for girls never reached gross status, but only Tonka truck induced indifference. Then Miss Ruth came to class.
      She was a student teacher in her senior year at Central Michigan University. Everyday she would stand in front of the chalkboard, her long brown hair swaying with the stroke of each cursive letter. She would call on us to answer math problems and although I hated long division, I loved Miss Ruth. Naturally, I gave her my only 'Bee Mine' Valentine card.
      Of course, as with any school-age crush, things didn't quite work out with Miss Ruth. It wasn't because I gave her too many apples or wrote her name all over my notebook. Instead, I threw up.
      I was striving for my second year in a row of perfect attendance when I started feeling sick. Miss Ruth suggested I go lay down on the 'sick' cot, I decided to stay in her classroom during lunch hour instead. I remember watching out the window as the fifth-grade band marched around the parking lot - then I lost it. At that moment, as Miss Ruth went down to the janitor's room for a coffee can full of that absorbent flaky orange stuff, my crush was crushed.
      Eventually, I reached a point in my life where being lovesick didn't require the sprinkling of any orange colored stuff. That is why tomorrow, right after lunch, I'm going down to the card shop and find that 'Bee Mine' Valentine and give it to Amy this time. Who knows, after six years of marriage, I might even pick up her very own 25 pack.
      Grand Traverse Herald editor Garret Leiva can be reached at 933-1416 or e-mail at gleiva@gtherald.com.