{"id":1392,"date":"2013-02-14T15:48:43","date_gmt":"2013-02-14T20:48:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/?p=1392"},"modified":"2013-02-14T15:48:43","modified_gmt":"2013-02-14T20:48:43","slug":"things-i-love-thursday-happy-valentines-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/things-i-love-thursday-happy-valentines-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Things I Love Thursday &#8211; Happy Valentine&#8217;s Day!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>What a delightful Thursday, and how nice of it to fall on Valentine&#8217;s Day. Even when I was single Valentine&#8217;s Day was one of those strange lovely days where I&#8217;d try and arrange online Valentine&#8217;s Day Card\/gift exchanges with strangers (and yes, this whole swapping thing has been ever present) and get wrapped up in the silly cute celebrations of love and affection.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m just &#8220;that guy,&#8221; you know&#8230; the one that takes a moment to take stock of all the &#8220;things [she] loves&#8221; every week? Yup. That one that reads about love stories (like the man who arranged to have flowers delivered to his wife on Valentine&#8217;s day), or the look on (especially elderly) same-sex couples faces after they get the same right and freedom to get married in those early days. Well, I tear up a little (or lots), I&#8217;m a sap. Yup. I also love Valentine&#8217;s Day, and the associated cookies, cakes, (recycled)paper cards, and other silliness.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\"><p>Oh my. Read this: <a title=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/jamster83\/status\/299982325494726657\/photo\/1\" href=\"http:\/\/t.co\/SKtDOgaX\">twitter.com\/jamster83\/stat\u2026<\/a> (via @<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/decath10n\">decath10n<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Shaun Usher (@LettersOfNote) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/LettersOfNote\/status\/300266242227458048\">February 9, 2013<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>JC made <a href=\"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/once-upon-a-valentines-day-with-help-from-bunners-and-cafe-belong\/\">last year&#8217;s Valentine&#8217;s Day pretty special<\/a>, because, as I&#8217;m finding out, he&#8217;s &#8220;that guy,&#8221; that one that seems to have a penchant for sweeping me off my feet in amazing and ridiculous gestures. With everyday kindnesses, and over-the-top surprises. As an example, it never\u00a0occurred\u00a0to me to celebrate (or keep track of) a 6-month anniversary, but there he was, making a date of it. Today&#8217;s dinner plans are a mystery (to me), but whatever we&#8217;re doing, I&#8217;m looking forward to spending it with him.<\/p>\n<p>The question is, are we just buying into obligate consumerism and consumption? Or romantic notions\u00a0we&#8217;ve\u00a0been spoon fed by movies and fairy tales? All I can say is maybe\u2026 (with a large attached question mark) but still be happy about today. I\u2019m a product of some collective conditioning, as I\u2019m sure we all are to some extent.\u00a0I&#8217;ve\u00a0embraced this day from my own idealized idea of it; a celebration of love, compassion, kindness, &amp; togetherness can\u2019t be all bad.<\/p>\n<p>To all of you making the world a little bit brighter, thank you for what you do, I love you.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ui_CNb4FUtQ\" height=\"158\" width=\"280\" allowfullscreen=\"\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>and here is a ridiculous video.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What a delightful Thursday, and how nice of it to fall on Valentine&#8217;s Day. Even when I was single Valentine&#8217;s Day was one of those strange lovely days where I&#8217;d try and arrange online Valentine&#8217;s Day Card\/gift exchanges with strangers (and yes, this whole swapping thing has been ever present)&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[356],"tags":[393],"class_list":["post-1392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-toronto-2","tag-valentines-day-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1392\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meshell.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}