Cold Beer & Meat Sweats - Valentines, Schmalentines

To Feel The Love

Forward: When I sat down yesterday to write this post I wasn’t sure what to say, or how to say it. I didn’t know my ending goal or have a point to my story, I just felt like writing about what love meant to me. Here is what unfolded after I sat down.

I don’t know how to start this post and I’m not really in the mood to write it. Tomorrow is Valentines Day and I will be celebrating with the one I love.

I love, love. I am a hopeless romantic. I am a super huge fan of movies that make me cry. My favorite part of any TV series and Movie is always the love story. I.E., Rachel and Ross, Noah and Allie, Jim and Pam, Olivia and Fitz, just to name a few. I am secretly sappy. Love is hard to explain, and the word is thrown around so much that it’s not always believable anymore. The reason I am even doing this post is because not everyone is surrounded by love, and when you are someone who happens to be lucky enough to have and be loved, then you should embrace it.

My heart has been broken to the point I felt as if there was no return. But, I come from a family who showered me with so much love that it was impossible to give up in life. Love isn’t just about flowers, heart candies -although delicious, cute, and wonderful-, and teddy bears. To me, love is a blessing. I am not bragging, I am not gloating, I am just simply recognizing that my parents and grandparents, along with close and distant family members were the first people in my life to show me what true love was supposed to be, and how it was supposed to feel, and I am forever grateful.

My Grandparents were married for 50 years. My Parents divorced when I was 1. Not a day in my childhood from birth to 18 went by without the support of both my mother and father. They might not have loved each other, but they loved me so much that it taught me how to truly care about someone. After I left for college, obviously, I didn’t always try to talk to my parents everyday because I was too busy trying to “discover myself”, but I never forgot how I grew up. When someone would try to take me down, mentally, or by breaking my heart, I would remember how much I love the world, how much I love to laugh, and how much I love the idea of creating the perfect life for myself, and I would get up and move on. Love is hard. It’s hard to find, it’s hard to maintain, it’s said to be easy with the right people but that doesn’t mean it is effortless. It’s only easy because love is the common denominator, and when that is understood, you can overcome anything.

The older I get, the more the definition of love changes. I mean, I have always loved pizza, cats, cheese, and ice cream but, saying you love someone, and committing to that in reality changes as you become older. When I moved to North Carolina 5 years ago, love showed up. My Mom and my Dad, whom don’t speak to each other, drove separately to Pittsburgh from Columbus, helped me pack up a van, a station wagon, and a car, and we all followed each other on this 8 hour adventure. 3 cars, all of us seperate yet, all of us doing this together. I was moving from Pitt to Raleigh because of a boy. Even though I kept telling myself it was for a “change in career”, and to be somewhere warmer, I knew it was because of a boy, and so did my parents. My divorced parents drove me from PGH to NC so I could be with the one I love. I don’t know much more of a love story than that. They moved me into a random house, with random roommates, and “the boy” was there to help. Afterwards, they kissed me on the cheek and separately drove back to Columbus, OH, as Mitch and I waved goodbye. That is why I love, love.

Mitch and I met in middle school, went to high school together, then didn’t see each other for about 8 years, or talk for that matter. On my 26th birthday I came to Raleigh, NC because my best friend was here on business and heaven forbid if we weren’t together to celebrate the big 26! Mitch happened to have a place in Raleigh for us to crash that April, and then, well, that following August I moved here. I’m now 31 and we will be celebrating 6 years together this spring. We both came from terrible heart aches, and helped each other back into trusting someone. He is my rock, my best friend, and he makes me feel like I must have done something right in this world, to have been so lucky to land someone like him. I love you, babe, Happy Valentines, Schmalentines Day.

I’ve decided to share some of my favorite photos with you guys! Scroll through to see the fun times we’ve had over the years, the awesome Pizza my Dad sends us on Valentines Day, the pancakes I made one year that spell out “I Love You”, and my favorite way to show him I care, the art of the sandwich.