love can be cheap

If one Valentine’s Day card doesn’t quite say it all -- not the mushy one or the funny one or the singing one or the sexy one -- you could get in serious trouble.

Me: This is the card you got me?

Him: I thought it was funny.

Me: How about the one that says I love you ‘til the end of time.

Him: That one costs more.

Me: Smart move.

Even if you do get it right, when you go to your Hallmark store, you have the sense of being taken for a ride and it’s not to the chapel of love.

For example, “I love the way we text.” If you love it so much, why not text? Why pay $8.99 on a card as hi-tech as washing clothes on a rough stone or cooking the raw flesh of a buffalo that used to roam free?

And we feel guilty, right, about not coming up with our own sentiments but being a parasite to others so much better at the most important key to a good relationship, communication.

Well take a page from Romeo and Juliet at my house. It doesn’t have to end so badly.

Me: Are you ready for our annual Valentine’s Day excursion?

Him: I suddenly feel very tired.

Me: Let’s get it over with.

Years ago, after buying lame cards that said something but not everything, that said something we could have said ourselves, that said something then ended up in a keepsake box never to be reopened -- my husband and I decided to go to Hallmark together and cheat on the cheap.

Meaning, we stand before rows of paper dripped in roses, fawning animals, giant hearts, glitter and sequins, and the occasional rude body sound, and we explore. When I pick a card I coulda woulda shoulda bought for $6 or $8 or even $10.99, I hand it over. He gets his smirk or blush or giggle, and it goes back on the shelf. Then it’s his turn.

This could go on for an hour until one of us gets sick to the stomach and we call it a holiday.

In between, we laugh our heads off, wondering if the store clerks have caught on. We’re manhandling the merchandise with no intention of buying, our sticky pizza hands -- we always start with lunch -- perhaps providing the evidence of our subterfuge.

Yet it’s romantic in that we’re-in-this-dumb-thing-together kind of way. He reads aloud, “You are hot pink in a sea of beige,” and bats his eyes like a hummingbird. I swoon.

“What a man you are,” I say next adoringly, or at least someone better than me said that.

He counters, “I love the sh*t outta you.” Yes, a real card.

And I retort: “Are you a campfire? ‘Cause you are hot and I want s’more.”

He groans and adds, “Our love is bigger and stronger than most couples and I’m proud of that.”

Yeah right.

I punt: “I love everything about you, except those things we’ve already discussed.”

Now we’re getting closer to home.

Dusted in sticky red shimmer, I know we’re near the end when my husband gets philosophical: “If you have to get a serious card, you should just get a divorce. A funny card is the only thing that makes sense in a long-time marriage.”

And we fall down on the floor laughing -- they are on to us now! -- then tumble out of the store drunk with the final convulsions of the yearly Valentine’s Day jaunt.  

And this we call love. I’m proud of that!

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