happy valentine's day!

i’ve never been a big fan of valentine’s day.

i don’t remember celebrating it before i entered kindergarten. so that first valentine’s day party was very exciting. i carefully prepared my valentines, and arrived to find a variety of sugary treats eagerly awaiting my arrival.

i don’t remember much about the party, but i do know that valentines were exchanged, and the consumption of unhealthy quantities of sugar occurred. i may even remember one of my parents cautioning me about the downfall of ingesting too much sweetness in one sitting once the remnants of my cardboard and construction paper mail box and i arrived home.

my mom got a degree in health and nutrition in college. as the first child, my sugary choices were limited. the only cookies i knew were oatmeal raisin and the russian tea-cakes my dad made once a year. (by the time number six came along, many of these healthy eating principals had gone out the window, except we all harbored an open disdain for store bought baked goods because the home made variety were so much better.) so needless to say, the aura of all the store-bought goodness was crippling. i didn’t have the willpower to muster up a “no” in the face of a new, different heart shaped confection.

my next memory is of the blue carpet in our ranch-style home. my bedroom was about ten 6-year old steps from the bathroom. that was approximately seven steps too many. before i knew it, the contents of my valentine’s day binge were all over the carpet.

needless to say, any valentine’s days that followed were eyed with suspicion. every school year after that, i would dutifully hand out my valentines and nibble on a brownie, but i would never party with the abandon that i’d had fateful first valentine’s day.

so what did i do today? made a half batch of oatmeal raisin cookies. they were quite tasty, still warm out of the oven.