Red Doesn’t Mean It’s a Viable Valentine Gift

Terry Donnelly

Valentine’s Day strikes fear in my heart. I know it’s supposed to be a day for expressing love and devotion, but I have exhibited behaviors in the past that, with all the best of intentions, have fallen far short of expectations.

Pat and I had been dating only a month or two when February 14 rolled around. This was 44 years ago. Even then, neither of us were spring chickens. We had both been married before and were going into this relationship with eyes wide open. I knew there was a bar that needed to be reached, I just didn’t know how high that bar had been raised.

Here is what went through my mind all those years ago as I thought through this dilemma:

“I know I need to get her something. A card. Yes, a card is good. I’m clever as all get out, so I’ll get a blank one and write something witty like ‘Roses are red and violets are purple. I like you better than maple surple.’ That’s perfect.”

With the card checked off my list, I took a deep breath, struck the lotus position, and ventured into musing about a gift. I quickly determined that a gift was necessary, but this relationship was neither long term nor committed at this point. I didn’t want to send any false messages.

Lingerie was out. Flowers? Always good, but too predictable. Chocolate? I did know that she loved chocolate, but wasn’t one for the heart-shaped box of a Whitman’s Sampler. She was hard-core and would prefer a block of Baker’s dark chocolate–the kind with which one usually cooks. She could just gnaw off a chunk to go along with our evening Cabernet. But, going to the baking aisle of the Kroger store for her gift didn’t seem quite right. 

Then a thunderbolt of inspiration hit me. I had been spending time hanging out at her house. We were teachers and we did a lot of lesson planning and grading papers at home in the evenings. Once, when stuck on a word (this was way before we owned smart-phones and the internet), I inquired as to the whereabouts of her dictionary. Unbelievably, she had none.

Eureka! That’s it!  I’d hit upon the perfect gift–a dictionary. This was well thought through–what could go wrong? I’d even buy her a red one just to kick up the romance a notch or two.

I was so proud–something practical, noncommittal, and well within my price range.

Off to the local book emporium I trotted whistling a tune. I think it was the song from Mary Poppins, “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”. I could sing it. I couldn’t spell it, but I soon would by putting my perfect gift to work! All was right with my world.

I bought the brightest red book I could find and wrapped it using my best folding techniques, just like Mother taught. A bow and the clever card were added to make a fine presentation.

The day came and I was light hearted––dare I say giddy? I was a man without fear on Valentine’s Day for the first time in years.

The second the light of my life and subject of Bobby Helms’ 1957 hit, “You are My Special Angel” hefted the beautifully wrapped gift and realized it wasn’t a box from Nordstrom’s, her eyes changed from glistening with anticipation to narrow slits riveted across the table burning through to my core.

I felt the first bead of perspiration on my brow.

“Wow! A dictionary. How sweet.”

Her flat tone told me all I needed to know. My good intentions were for naught.

I haven’t lived down that faux pas. It took us three more years to marry and we have been in wedded bliss for 41 years. Every once in a while, over the course of our four-plus decades together I hear Tess True-Love speaking under her breath. I always take the bait and play Charlie Brown to her Lucy, asking her to repeat.

“What was that Dear?”

The answer is always the same, “You got me a dictionary!?”

We kept that tome until just a few years ago when my thoughtful wife bought me a new, unabridged version for my birthday. The bright red cover had worn away from the spine of the old one revealing the brown, cross thatch of webbing that secures the pages. Several bundles of those pages had separated and in forty-some years a number of new words had been added to the English language.  It was past time to replace the first gift I ever gave her.

That old dictionary can be found on the book exchange shelf in the Oasis Country Club members’ lounge in Mesquite, Nevada. It sits on display as everlasting testimony to all good and true intentions gone awry.