To My Friends In Relationships This Valentine’s Day

Hey guys,

I know you’re deliriously happy in a beautiful and committed romantic relationship, but I wanted to give you a heads up about Valentine’s Day this Saturday.

While you’re exchanging blood diamonds, chocolate truffles in heart-shaped boxes, and sterile greeting cards decorated with cherubic Cupids and soaked with artificial sentiment, please, please leave me out of it.

I recognize that you have grown accustom to sharing your boundless happiness with me, but this time, honestly, I want no part in your extravagant getaway replete with couples massages and erotic poetry. I especially don’t want to hear about how you’re re-enacting scenes from 50 Shades of Grey, either. It’s bad enough knowing that my own mother, as well as mothers all around the world, have “experienced the phenomenon.” Spare me.

That means no Instagrams, no Snapchats, no gooey, lovey-dovey Facebook posts about how much you love one another and your V-day gifts. No selfies of you guys feeding each other, chocolate fondue dripping down your chins. Show just a modicum of discretion. I do not care about what kind of fancy food you’re eating by candlelight at which exclusive restaurant, or how much you enjoy snuggling by the fire, or, really what kind of amorous activities you guys are getting yourselves into at all.

It’s not that I’m not delighted that you’ve found each other, because I really am, but that’s just it: you have each other and you don’t need to go showing off and making the rest of the world (including me) hate you. Be happy with each other. Keep your intimates private and your privacy intimate.

As you know, Valentine’s Day is a Saturday this year, which means that for once, I don’t have to endure the parade of stuffed animals and rose bouquets march past my desk at the office. So after I go about my normal weekend routine, I will probably spend the rest of my day holed up in my room binge-watching re-runs of The Office and throwing popcorn at the screen every once in a while. Especially when Jim and Pam get together, because as much as I like them (and you), Valentine’s Day makes me just a tad bitter.

Not that I’m anti-love or anti-romance or anti-Valentine’s Day in any way. Okay, maybe just a little on the last one because let’s be serious, it’s much more than Singles Awareness Day. Mid-January to mid-February is basically singles awareness month, in which grocery stores stock aisles awash in red with mass-produced low-grade chocolates and unfeeling V-day cards, and marketers endlessly bombard us with commercials highlighting model-beautiful couples sharing life-changing moments punctuated with a trendy gift of the moment. To me, it’s simply ridiculous that there’s all this hullabaloo about a day dedicated to lovers considering that Valentine’s Day is a mostly made-up holiday that relies on shady folklore to sell you diamonds and heart-shaped paraphernalia in the name of celebrating love. By the way, the flowers you’re buying, the ones that you’ll stick in a vase and watch wilt and dry. They’re probably from Latin America and supporting an industry that endangers female flower workers and their children. Just saying. But by all means, if you absolutely need them, go ahead.

Above all, please don’t feel sorry for me in my single solitude. I don’t need your pity, but if you have any leftover molten chocolate lava cake, I’ll take it. K? Thanks.

Love,
Your devoted and fabulously single friend