my funny valentine('s day)

I know three young women who are currently engaged. All of them are smart, beautiful and will be marrying “the man of their dreams.”

All of them are also sophomores in college. Two became engaged before their twentieth birthday, and the other one celebrated her twentieth birthday only two weeks before her engagement. Two of them already have their wedding dresses picked out. One recently updated on her Facebook that she was “so sad” that she was almost done planning her wedding. One had been dating her now fiancée for three years before their engagement, one is engaged to her on-and-off boyfriend of two years and the most recently engaged has been with her fiancée for a little over a year, which includes a two-to-three month break. 

And while I am happy for them because they are happy, the cynic in me worries that, for them, an engagement does not mean true love, especially at such a (fairly) young age.

With Single’s Awareness Day right around the corner- because, no, I don’t celebrate the overly commercialized Valentine’s Day- combined with the above realization, I can’t help but wonder: what’s the big rush?

While I’m not much of a romantic, the one thing about love and relationships that always melts my heart is the idea of the promise ring. When the boy slides that simple ring onto the girl’s finger and promises that, one day, he will replace it with something better? Yeah, it gets me every time, as much as I hate to admit that I do have a little bit of a soft side.  

For the longest time, I couldn’t understand why I loved the promise ring, but shutter(ed) at the thought of engagement and marriage. But I may have finally found my answer: perhaps why I love the idea so much is that there is logic and rationale behind it. 

What it says is, “Realistically, we aren’t ready to give the rest of our lives to each other. But I know that one day I will, and I will wait until we are.” It’s the smart engagement ring.

To me, the waiting and the promise of something more is what makes love interesting and what helps it to grow. 

Sure, promises can be broken. But isn’t that what love is? Giving your heart completely and totally to somebody? Knowing that they could break it beyond repair, but trusting and knowing that they won’t?

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Happy Single’s Awareness Day to all (and I suppose Happy Valentine’s Day to those sentimental few). Enjoy your day full of roses, crappy heart-shaped boxes of chocolate and expensive dinners. For those who want to celebrate the right way- wine, good chocolate and a shitty romantic movie to ridicule at my place.