7 minute read
MY VALENTINE by Carrie Welch
My Valentine by Carrie Welch
I had a fairy tale in my head. Of what romance was supposed to look like. A prince or knight in shining armor would sweep the princess off her feet and pledge his undying love for her. And of course, they lived “happily ever after.” Because in my childhood brain “happily ever after” existed. I just had to find it. I wanted that fairy tale. I wanted to be the princess, loved by a man who battled demons for her, killed evil queens, dominated dragons and rescued her over and over again.
Who doesn’t want to be loved that much? In school I fantasized about one of the boys in class rescuing me. In first grade I asked a boy I had a crush on if he would be my valentine. He said yes, giggled and ran away. I thought he would call me or meet me under my window at night with a song or poem. He said yes to my request, so certainly he wanted to show me how much he loved me!
Nothing happened. Valentine’s Day came and went. All I received was a heart shaped box of chocolate from my mom who gushed over and over about how much she loved me.
In middle school I liked another boy. He was a friend of mine who I just knew had a secret crush on me, and perhaps would fight a dragon for me if the situation presented itself. One day he stood next to me in line for something school related, leaning against a brick wall. I had on long sleeves and rolled them up because I was hot. His arm brushed mine and I smiled. His reaction was the exact opposite; he jumped away from me, proclaiming, “eeeewwwww!” for all of our classmates to hear. “Your arms are so hairy!” he announced. I sank into a dark imaginary hole as the fantasy died a little more.
That night I went home and shaved my arms. I kept shaving them for a whole year until my mom noticed. She asked me to stop because they were perfect as they were and not too hairy in the slightest. I stopped shaving my arms.
In high school there was this football player I thought was cute. He was big and strong and in my art class. He picked on me mercilessly, so naturally I believed he liked me. Until the picking on me stopped and he suddenly had a girlfriend that wasn’t me.
Also in high school I had a crush on this boy I knew from all the way back in elementary school. I think he liked me too since he kissed me a few times, and brought me flowers and balloons for my birthday. I thought maybe this one would fight a dragon for me or truly love me. But then he never answered or returned my calls. I was a ghost of an idea, something he could try out and turn away.
In college I had a boyfriend. We met through friends and he went to a university far from my university. We had a long-distance relationship but we made it work. We slept together one evening when I visited. I lost my virginity. He decided afterwards to go hang out with his friends while I stayed in his bed.
I remember I cried. I called mom after I returned home and told her everything. She asked if I was okay and said, “As long as you respect and love yourself.”
I kept the relationship but it was never the same. I started to believe it was the long distance that made things difficult. Maybe if I lived closer, he would love me. How I craved to be loved by him. He asked if I would consider switching schools. So I did. I transferred, got an apartment, a job, and started taking a few classes at his university.
Then I found out he was cheating on me. The knight in shining armor was supposed to kill the evil queens, not have sex with them!
The flicker of hope inside me was dead. I figured I would give them all what they wanted. I could use the only power I seem to have, my sexuality. I quit school and started working as a cocktail waitress to make enough money to keep my new apartment. I spent many nights drinking and flirting. I started having sex with different people. Thinking this was how they would finally fall in love with me. I was dumbfounded when a man I’d been sleeping with asked me to marry him. That really worked?
But it didn’t. He was not my knight in shining armor and would never battle demons for me. He was just an image of something that could have been. We divorced within five years.
I kept moving through the motions. Relationships came and went, none of them ever matching up to my standards. Even when they seemed to actually care, I kept them at a distance and never opened my heart to them. They were the enemy and I had to stay behind enemy lines to protect myself.
Mom once told me my dad was not a knight in shining armor. He was just a man who was interested and asked her out. So surely, I would find the perfect man - someone who would sweep me off my feet and pledge his undying love for me - someone who would do anything for me. I desperately wanted to be loved that much.
I had a fairy tale in my head. But then my mom got sick. Cancer spread throughout her body. I was living far away at the time and decided to move home as soon as possible. I walked into her room at a rehabilitation center and her face lit up as if a halo surrounded her. “It’s you!”she exclaimed. “I’ve missed you so much!” I joined her there in that halo and said, “I’ve missed you too Mom.”
I stayed with her for four months, helping her finish the last little bit of her life. Rarely did I leave her side, as I knew she would do the same for me. We fought demons together, we battled evil queens, and dominated dragons. But this left her exhausted and she finally let go and died.
Her halo never left me. She rescues me over and over again, just as she always did. The deepest kind of love lived in my mother’s gestures, her listening ear, her smile, and those small heart-shaped boxes of chocolates on Valentine's day.
Carrie Welch has been writing since the day she first picked up a pencil. If she couldn’t be found around the house, her mom knew there was a good chance she was up in a tree with her journal, scribbling away. Inspired in the 80’s by Shell Silverstien, she spent her childhood writing poems and quickly watched her writing skills grow into prose and short stories. Carrie received a BA in English and Creative Writing from the University of Houston, Downtown. She continued her studies, receiving a Masters in Clinical Counseling from Montana State University. She enjoys using the written word as a therapeutic tool for depression, anxiety, trauma and in her work as a grief counselor. Now, with plenty of life experience and finding herself in her forties’s she is delighted to start sharing her stories with the world.
