‘Twas the night before Valentine’s . . .
Of all the holidays, Valentine’s Day has to be the most unsettling, at least if you’re a woman. It’s all lopsided. Men don’t wander around with their heads stuck in a cloud of fantasies about heart-shaped truffles and crimson flower petals. Women, on the other hand, have Expectations. But the fulfillment of said expectations is completely out of our control, and so comes the anxiety. Will he pick out something you really like, so you’re not stuck with the awkwardness of pretending, or, alternately, disappointing him by being disappointed? Or — yikes — will he even remember at all?
Case in point: the Weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal ran a his-n-hers Valentine’s gift feature aptly titled “The Most Dangerous Gift of the Year.” The first four gifts suggested by “he shops” (Alan Murray) were chopsticks for two, red satin sheets (!), a kama sutra pleasure box (!!), and a wine-to-go kit (a box with insulated wine storage compartment, glasses, and corkscrew. Wine sold separately.)
This, my friends, suggests desperation, if not panic.
I don’t blame the fellows. I sympathize with you. The cold reality, however, is that there are no cookie cutter gifts. The very best gifts are the ones that you pick out because you’ve noticed what someone you love notices. When you find that gift, you’ve hit on the art of it. But that’s hard to do, and in any case, it’s a year-round thing, not something you can manage in an hour on February 13.
So what are the alternatives? Fall back on the old standards: flowers, chocolates, a romantic dinner — with two caveats: avoid tacky (unless, of course, she’s a goner for kitch) and, if you can, personalize it a bit. Have the florist use the same flowers as were in her wedding bouquet. Stuff like that. Crazy as things have gotten, we’re still crazy for . . . stuff like that.
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