Twas the Night Before Valentines

Image courtesy of Lisa Weidmeier WANA Commons.

Image courtesy of Lisa Weidmeier WANA Commons.

I figure today we will have some light fun. Five years ago, I was still single, and it was right at Valentines, and I was seriously feeling like chopped liver. So, I sat down and scribbled out this fun little poem to give myself (and other singles) a good laugh. I hope it makes all of you smile. Hey, pass on the love to some single pals while you are at it :D.

So without further ado…

Twas the Night Before Valentines…by Kristen Lamb

Twas the night before Valentines, and all through the land

The poor single people were wringing their hands

Handcuffs were hung by the nighties with care

Near the lotions and chocolates and mint underwear.

A day made by Hallmark to sell lots of stuff

Pushing candies and kittens and kisses and fluff

A day that makes “Single” a social disease

Like bubonic or typhoid or chiggers or fleas

And that fat baby Cupid must be on the take

Paid in buckets of cash and red velvet cake.

Love songs are played on every damn station

As “mush” takes over our entire nation.

Now not that we’re jaded, us single-type folk

We’ve tried Facebook and Match, and Equally-Yoked

We’ve tried parks and clubs and churches and bars

And a handful resorted to wishing on stars.

Like most other people, we want company

Without drama or fighting or disharmony.

No Jerry Springer or Kardashian drama

We have no time for all of that trauma.

Maybe we’re picky, world-weary, or fussy

Because we won’t date any Joe Schmo or hussy.

We want someone good-looking, gentle and sweet.

Hey, just cuz we’re single doesn’t make us minced meat.

We don’t begrudge the romance of others

The passion of courtship, the heat between lovers.

Before you judge my singular state

Think back to the days when YOU had to date.

Tomorrow we’ll stand in the grocery store line

Behind the husband with a bottle of wine

And a “Get-Well” bouquet cuz he waited too late

To find the red roses to give to his mate.

Hallmark has trained you to scurry and dash

Into its stores with fistfuls of cash.

For stuffed little critters with a lap full of love

And boxes of chocolate morsels from Dove.

Singles won’t stand hours waiting to dine

On elf food with garnish and overpriced wine.

No chocolates with abnormal tropical middles

Or angst about thighs that may wiggle and jiggle.

No staying in bars desperately late

Trying to connect with a last-minute date.

So embrace your status and shout it out loud.

Yes, I am single! Single and Proud!

So all you single commenters out there, at least you know we WANAites love you. Enjoy being single. And, yes, if any of you want to repost this as a blog, you are welcome to so long as you link here and give me credit. When school children are studying great 21st century literature and are assigned to write essays about my poem, I want the credit for this literary genius :D.

 

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  1. Love the poem!!

  2. I love it! 😀 I think if I have to see one more Adrianna Lima commercial on TV this year I’m gonna barf! 😀

  3. That’s a great poem and I definitely think a lot of people need to hear that message every now and then! I’m single by choice; I’m not interested in a romantic relationship, so Valentine’s Day is just a waste, in my opinion.
    Besides, why wait for a specific day to be kind to your beloved, if you’re in a relationship?

  4. You are SO right Natasha! I’m not a single, but this poem is “Such Fun!” if I may quote my favorite Brit-com, Miranda. My wife and I have never made a big deal of Valentines Day, and I love her more for it. People are astonished that we don’t buy into it, and I get warnings every year that she Really Does want to celebrate it, even if she says otherwise. The fact is, we are kind to each other all year, so Valentines is just another day… with sappier commercials.

    Have a happy Everyday!
    ~Greg

  5. Being single conflicts me sometimes. I see couples and I wish that I was paired up. Then sanity sets in. I remember trying to manipulate (sorry) get my then girlfriend to change her habit of trying to manipulate me into doing what she wanted. She dumped me. But I won. I learned to be independent (after a while) and love it. The poem should be posted outside every card shop to let the paired ones know we’re okay.

  6. Love the poem! Happy Everyday indeed!

  7. Love the poem! Singles aren’t the only ones feel the pressure to get all romantical (it’s a verb, look it up!). Manufactured holidays make us feel guilty for feeling otherwise.

    Me, I’ll be watching the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show on TV with my very furry significant other on Valentine’s Night because my hey-honey will be working until who-knows-when. Tax season knows no romance…

  8. Love it! I was oh so single forever when I was younger. It wasn’t that great at the time, but now I’m kind of pleased i had that time to myself. I hope you are too 🙂

  9. Ha! Love this, Kristen. I bet it’s that very strong-and-single pizzazz that drew Mr. Right to your corner.

  10. Kristin, that is the sweetest and funniest poem I’ve read in a long time. You have a wonderful talent.

  11. Single and proud WANAgal here (looking to club, um, open to meet Mr. Right)! 🙂 Love the poem, Kristen! The pic is hilarious. I’m a romantic at heart (deep down, hidden in the creases), yet want to do just that to Cupid for the marketing bonanza that falls around Valentine’s and Sweetest Day (hello, fake holiday). Single folks aren’t disgruntled. We just want love and coupledom for happiness sake. *heading to crank on some Chicago and Luther V.*

  12. Too funny. I’m not single but oh, how I could have used those thoughts back in the day, when for the days before and after V-day everything seems to conspire to make you think there is something wrong with you if you aren’t hooked up. And I remember all the desperate (my friends, not mine) attempts to get hooked up before V-day so they could cash in! A little self-esteem, people! You can buy your own damn roses any time you want!

    Thanks for a good laugh, and I agree with August!

  13. Love it! I am single and proud!

  14. A little poem!?

    Excellent, by the way. Although I usually start tying the noose when I’m single and alone on Valentines Day. 🙂

  15. That is awesome!! It has been 12 years since I was single for Valentine’s day, but I still remember that feeling all to well. All I wanted when I was single was to have an awesome on Valentine’s Day. Since I started dating my now-husband, we pretty much ignore it–at my request. 🙂 Totally not worth $75 for flowers that are normally $25.

  16. That poem made me giggle. 🙂

    I love it. Before I met my husband, I literally spent 23 out of 24 Valentine’s Days single, so I can relate. I also have a cousin and two good friends who have their birthday on that day, which I can attest to as being the most unfortunate day to be born. NO ONE wants to hang out with you on your birthday. Either they’re single with their snout buried in a Ben & Jerry’s container or they’re off making big enough googly eyes to make Cookie Monster whimper into his cups.

    I think I will change Valentine’s Day into Happy BIRTHDAY Day in honor of my friends. Heh.

  17. While I would love to have a “companion of the heart”, right now I am contentedly single and the only “lover” on my immediate horizon is my new computer…;0)

    Loved the poem and love your blog as always…I wonder sometimes how you manage to always come up with first rate posts? I should be so lucky…lol

  18. roflmao…love it!

    • Brianna Soloski on February 10, 2012 at 12:24 pm
    • Reply

    Very cute. Thanks for sharing.

    • Ed on February 10, 2012 at 12:27 pm
    • Reply

    Thank you for joining the masses who have exposed Valentine’s Day for what it is: a giant marketing heyday to fill in the gaps between New Year and Easter.

    There are days when I have wanted a relationship, but a lot of my friends have already been through all of that and ended up missing their single days. I’m graduating from college in a few months and heading out of the country to do two internships, so a relationship at this point would only be a hindrance.

    Really, I wish more people would celebrate their uniqueness in being single. It’s high time we put an end to our culture’s pressure to “be in a relationship.” There are so many other ways you can know you are loved and feel validated without forcing yourself into a supposedly romantic relationship with someone.

  19. That was awesome! Here’s to the single folks out there! Cheers!

    Patricia Rickrode
    w/a Jansen Schmidt

  20. Hilarious. As someone with the “social disease” of happy singlehood. I relate to every word. Even when I was married, I hated the holiday. I think most men hate it too. Thanks for the much needed laugh.

  21. Awwh…just read this while waiting for See’s Candies to open up (for the kids & my mom), I felt understood, laughed , and want to share it with my single friends-thanks. XOXO

  22. Lovely just lovely.
    Let’s put this to music.
    XOXO
    Chocolate kisses with oozy foreign centres.

  23. Love it! I am not single but have friends who are and who could relate to this. 🙂

  24. Love it love it love it! I gave up Valentine’s Day for Lent years ago, and never took it back. For me, it’s known as the day after my sister’s birthday. 🙂 Thanks for sharing, Kristen!
    ~Cate

  25. That rhyme is great fun! It reminds me I must repost my cynical ‘alternative Valentine slogan’ list nearer the time.
    That Cupid made me get the thought it would be fun to have a picture of the Dove of Peace similarly impaled, with Cupid holding a bow and saying, ‘Oops!’

  26. Okay, I admit it – I hate Valentines Day! And I’m not single. I still hate it. I am the least romantic person out there, I bet *laugh* – – lawd! Poor GMR . . .

    Love the cupid pic – haw!

    and love your poem!

  27. I’m not single and I still detest this holiday. I don’t want chocolates, they give me migraines and when they arrive anyway, I eat them and get a horrible migraine every day until they’re gone–chocolate is my downfall. I do love the flowers, but roses from the commercial market don’t really have the wonderful smell that home grown roses have-can’t even compare, so they only thing to enjoy is the vision of the blood red roses in their vase as they die slowly day by day. No, don’t care for the commercial Valentine’s day. Love the card, though.
    Thanks for sharing your funny poem.

    • Diane on February 10, 2012 at 2:08 pm
    • Reply

    Love, love, love the poem. Do you ever know how to turn a phrase! Married or single, Valentines Day is a gimmick for adults, I agree. I remember in grammar school receiving valentines from my classmates. Now that was Valentines Day, 9-year old style. Giggles, snickers, and embarrassment.
    Thanks for making this girl’s day.

  28. A child-bride 36 years ago, I grow my own roses.

  29. I’m single but hate V-day for a totally different reason. (It’s my birthday, so I have a thing against the holiday!) Makes me want to hide for four weeks a year as it approaches.

  30. Hi,
    I really enjoyed the poem, couldn’t help but have a smile while I was reading, well done. 🙂

  31. Thoroughly enjoyed the “funnies” here on this Night Before a Single’s Valentine Day ditty! When I was single (or “un-paired up”), my good friends and dear family members would flood me with silly Valentines and candy, always lots of candy. My hubby says Valentine’s Day is his favorite holiday!

  32. OMG! Loving the picture…poor Cupid, but that’s what he gets. LOL. Thank you for the smile.

  33. Very well written and amusing all the same 🙂

    Valentines day can be whatever we want it to be. I see no reason to hate the day, if anything, it can be a reminder to spend some more time with your partner than you usually would in your busy lives.

    There should never be any pressure for anyone to be in a relationship, but isn’t love something that we all want? With the right person, of course… And that in itself can take many years and wrong relationships to find.

    I have a fun valentines day poem to share 🙂

    Roses are red, violets are plastic.
    Thanks for last night, it was utterly fantastic.

    (happy married man who spends every day appreciating his wife, not needing a special day… But realising that it’s *our* day to spend how we choose with each other)

      • Diane on February 10, 2012 at 8:28 pm
      • Reply

      Nicely said, Peter. Any chance you’re up for cloning?????

  34. Cute. Wish Valentine’s Day was much less commercial and turned back to the true meanings of love. But I’m a traditionalist, I guess. http://caroleditosti-thefatandtheskinny.blogspot.com

  35. Here is something your readers and you might be interested in at the Four Seasons…a Valentine’s Day giveaway. You can see the details on FB…a $2500 gift card. Not too bad to share with your favorite Valentine…especially if you are in love. http://technorati.com/social-media/article/four-seasons-facebook-giveaway-celebrating-valentines/

  36. I am definitely, definitely not single! But I used to be. I was happy being single, actually. Then along came this tall, handsome man and the rest is history.

    Great poem – when I was single I certainly would have appreciated it!

  37. Nice poem. I am a Valentines Day Non-Fan. Single. CAN relate.

    I’m thinking maybe someone should write one like this…

    All the Whos down in Whoville loved Valentines day a lot…
    But the Grinch… who lived just North of Whoville… did not.

    Think of the possibilities! 😉

  38. *applauds* Awesome poem, Kristen. Great message and it made me laugh.

    A shame that the US Valentine’s day excludes those who don’t have sweethearts. In Finland 14th of February is Friends’ Day. It’s a day for everyone. And even better for businesses 😉

  39. Love the poem!! Being single on Valentine’s sucks, but then it feels the same way on Sweetest Day’s too. I know the holiday’s to celebrate love between a couple but since I’m not half of that right now, I extend Valentine’s Day to my children and get them treats and celebrate having someone in your live to love. I hope I teach them it’s not necessary to be part of a twosome to be happy or enjoy any day.

  40. Brilliant! I’ve been happily married 24 years, but I well remember those gloomy Valentine’s Days when I was single!

  41. Loved the poem:)…I’m not single, but I was for a period of time…somehow I escaped the Valentine bleakness. Flowers still arrived…but it gave me a glimpse inside the world of single-dom and the little flutter of “what if?”:)

    Lo

    • D.J. Lutz on February 11, 2012 at 6:06 pm
    • Reply

    My daughter and her friends (all single) say that V-day is really “Singles Awareness Day” – SAD for short. Then they all go out together and have a great time without cow-towing (sp?) to the evils of Hallmark’s marketing team (their words.)

  42. Love the poem. Am married and like so many other people commenting I find the day to be just another commercial guilt trip. So glad my husband does too. I would probably be mad if he spent a ton of money.

  43. I enjoyed the poem a lot. And yes, I am happy being a single. 🙂

  44. LOVED the poem 🙂 The original happens to be one of my favorites to re-write, too.
    Happy Valentine’s Day and your choice of the best cyber-flowers, -teddy bears or -teddies , -Pandora (or knock-off) bracelets, -chocolates, -anything your l’il heart desires! xoxo Candice

  45. Awwwwww, so there is a softer side after all. 🙂 i like it, though the line “Handcuffs were hung by the nighties with care” worries me. One day, little one is going to buy you a card, then you’ll cry!

    Cheers!

  46. I am single…I believe my writing is my outlet! Thanks for the poem…super-cute.

  47. Absolutely fantastic!

  48. this is just so cute!!

    • Jan on February 14, 2012 at 9:41 pm
    • Reply

    Well, I’m not single, not for almost 37 years, but I don’t feel Cupid is much of a sweetheart around here. Did nothing, got nothing, kind of let down. Yes, I gave him a Valentine’s card, all I could do, he owns all the money… But hey! I’ve got my books! I create my own characters, they know me, and they like me. I think I’ll go back to my own little world!

  49. This was a great read, even if I’m not single! You mention a drawing for January, but we’re in February now. Are you going to do one for February? Thanks! Lisa

    1. Just a typo. Doh!

  50. Love it Ms. Kristen. Thanks for making me smile. I think this will be the first V-Day where I’m not overly depressed and just trying to forget this day exists…*sighs*

    1. Love is for every day ;). It shouldn’t need a holiday.

  51. I don’t have the time to go on the dates I don’t want to go on anyway… 😈

    My love is now writing, and I plan to spend tomorrow doing just that!

  52. Wonderful play, great rhythm, flowed well. A job very well done. 😉

    1. Thanks :D. Not a poet but that year was particularly inspired, LOL.

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